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Bacteria and phenoptosis

  • Phenoptosis
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Abstract

Genetically programmed death of an organism, or phenoptosis, can be found not only in animals and plants, but also in bacteria. Taking into account intrapopulational relations identified in bacteria, it is easy to imagine the importance of phenoptosis in the regulation of a multicellular bacterial community in the real world of its existence. For example, autolysis of part of the population limits the spread of viral infection. Destruction of cells with damaged DNA contributes to the maintenance of low level of mutations. Phenoptosis can facilitate the exchange of genetic information in a bacterial population as a result of release of DNA from lysed cells. Bacteria use a special “language” to transmit signals in a population; it is used for coordinated regulation of gene expression. This special type of regulation of bacterial gene expression is usually active at high densities of bacteria populations, and it was named “quorum sensing” (QS). Different molecules can be used for signaling purposes. Phenoptosis, which is carried out by toxin-antitoxin systems, was found to depend on the density of the population; it requires a QS factor, which is called the extracellular death factor. The study of phenoptosis in bacteria is of great practical importance. The components that make up the systems ensuring the programmed cell death, including QS factor, may be used for the development of drugs that will activate mechanisms of phenoptosis and promote the destruction of pathogenic bacteria. Comparative genomic analysis revealed that the genes encoding several key enzymes involved in apoptosis of eukaryotes, such as paracaspases and metacaspases, apoptotic ATPases, proteins containing NACHT leucine-rich repeat, and proteases similar to mitochondrial HtrA-like protease, have homologs in bacteria. Proteomics techniques have allowed for the first time to identify the proteins formed during phenoptosis that participate in orderly liquidation of Streptomyces coelicolor and Escherichia coli cells. Among these proteins enzymes have been found that are involved in the degradation of cellular macromolecules, regulatory proteins, and stress-induced proteins. Future studies involving methods of biochemistry, genetics, genomics, proteomics, transcriptomics, and metabolomics should support a better understanding of the “mystery” of bacterial programmed cell death; this knowledge might be used to control bacterial populations.

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Abbreviations

ALD:

apoptotic-like death

EDF:

extracellular death factor

PCD:

programmed cell death

QS:

quorum sensing

TA complex:

toxin-antitoxin complex

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Belozersky Institute of Physico-Chemical Biology, Lomonosov Moscow State University, 119992, Moscow, Russia

    O. A. Koksharova

  2. Institute of Molecular Genetics, Russian Academy of Sciences, pl. Akademika Kurchatova 2, 123182, Moscow, Russia

    O. A. Koksharova

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  1. O. A. Koksharova
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Correspondence to O. A. Koksharova.

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Original Russian Text © O. A. Koksharova, 2013, published in Biokhimiya, 2013, Vol. 78, No. 9, pp. 1229–1238.

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Koksharova, O.A. Bacteria and phenoptosis. Biochemistry Moscow 78, 963–970 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0006297913090010

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