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Functional Homology of the Sex-Factor and Resistance Transfer Factors

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Abstract

DRUG-BESISTANT bacteria can emerge from sensitive populations by acquiring a ‘resistance factor’ (R-factor)1,2 from another strain by conjugation. Genetically, an R-factor behaves as an extrachromosomal structure2 belonging to the same class of elements as the transmissible sex-factor (F)3,4 of Escherichia coli, and its derivatives (designated F′) in which a fragment of bacterial chromosome has become associated with F (ref. 5). In an R-factor a collection of genes determining resistance to one or as many as six different drugs is transferred as a single unit of inheritance linked to a resistance transfer factor (RTF) responsible for the transmission2.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Medical Research Council Microbial Genetics Research Unit, Hammersmith Hospital,

    ELINOR MEYNELL & NAOMI DATTA

  2. Department of Bacteriology, Postgraduate Medical School, London

    ELINOR MEYNELL & NAOMI DATTA

Authors
  1. ELINOR MEYNELL
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  2. NAOMI DATTA
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MEYNELL, E., DATTA, N. Functional Homology of the Sex-Factor and Resistance Transfer Factors. Nature 207, 884–885 (1965). https://doi.org/10.1038/207884a0

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