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Team:CU-Boulder/Project
From 2012.igem.org
Contents |
Project 1: Bacterial Nightlight
The lux gene for producing light:
Lux CDE - synthesizes fatty acid aldehyde with acyl-CoA as starting substrate
LuxD: transferase
LuxE: synthetase
LuxC: reductase
LuxAB- dimer that reduces O2 and oxides aldehyde and FMNH2 to produce light!
Lux G - Not an essential gene for the system but increases the light produced by reducing FMN+
Possible Promoter systems:
Circadian clock - KaiABC/SasA/RpaA is the simplest oscillator found in cyanobacteria, Synechococcus elongatus
Blue Light Induced - YcgE/YcgF is endogenous to E. Coli. We have the system built and are testing it now.
Red light Induced - Cph8/PCB/OmpR is a system that won iGEM in 2006 but every team that has used it since has run into problems
Project 2: Biofilm Prevention
Quorum Sensing in LuxR containing Bacteria
This year the CU iGEM team has harnessed the quorum sensing factors endogenous in the Salmonella enterica serovar typhimurium LT2 strain to detect AHLs produced by other bacteria. Neither Salmonella nor E. coli have been shown to produce detectable levels of AHLs, so they were model organisms for the detection of other AHL producing bacteria such as Vibrio fisheri, or pathogenic bacteria such as Yersinia pestis. AHLs are small molecules synthesized by most gram negative bacteria, and are able to freely diffuse throughout the membrane. When the concentration of AHL producing bacteria in a specific area increases, the total concentration of AHLs diffusing into the cytoplasm also increases. Once a threshold level of AHLs are in the cytosol, transcription factors like the Vibrio fisheri LuxR or Salmonella enterica SdiA activate gene synthesis for quorum factors to be produced. In pathogenic bacteria, these signals have been shown to activate transcription of pathogenic factors.
Detection and silencing of AHL producing bacteria
The SdiA transcription factor has been shown to be more sensitive to lower concentrations and a greater diversity of AHLs than its LuxR homolog. We took advantage of this extra-sensitivity to create a detection system for AHL producing bacteria, while additionally attaching the detection system to the secretion of potent AHLases such as the Aiia enzyme, and a reporter protein RFP. Using this construct we tested whether we could disrupt the quorum sensing signal AHLs in order to keep them from reaching the threshold concentration to activate the less sensitive LuxR receptor. The V. fisheri species and other pathogenic bacteria use the LuxR receptor, therefore inhibition of AHLs would keep V. fisheri from producing light. Keeping the V. fisheri from producing light is an analogous model to keeping pathogenic bacteria from being stimulated by AHLs to release their pathogenesis factors.
Inhibiting quorum sensing in bacteria has been shown to not only inhibit the transcription of pathogenesis factors, but also to keep biofilms from forming. In the history of iGEM teams have used secreted enzymes to digest biofilms that have already been made, but our use of quorum sensing inhibitors have gone a step further, and are being tested in their ability to keep bacteria from making biofilms in the first place.
Experiments
1. Test whether the SdiA pSrgE cassette is more sensitive to extracellular AHLs than the LuxR LuxpR cassette. This will be done by placing an RFP behind the cassette, and using the plate reader to determine the fluorescence at a given concentration of RFP.
2. Use the SdiA pSrgE cassette’s sensitivity to inhibit the LuxR LuxpR system. Attach an AHLase and YFP to the more sensitive SdiA/pSrgE cassette. Co-culture the AHLase/YFP construct with a LuxR/LuxpR-RFP bacteria. The culture should turn fluoresce yellow, and not turn red.
3. Test the SdiA pSrgE cassette’s inhibition effects with Vibrio fisheri acting as a pathogen analogue. Co-culture the SdiA/pSrgE/YFP/Aiia cells with V. fisheri and use the plate reader to show that co-cultures will keep V. fisheri from emitting light at given ODs.
