RESUMO
BACKGROUND: Enterobacter sp. YSU is resistant to several different heavy metal salts, including selenite. A previous study using M-9 minimal medium showed that when the selenite concentration was 100,000 times higher than the sulfate concentration, selenite entered Escherichia coli cells using two pathways: a specific and a non-specific pathway. In the specific pathway, selenite entered the cells through a yet to be characterized channel dedicated for selenite. In the non-specific pathway, selenite entered the cells through a sulfate permease channel. Addition of L-cystine, an L-cysteine dimer, appeared to indirectly decrease selenite import into the cell through the non-specific pathway. However, it did not affect the level of selenite transport into the cell through the specific pathway. RESULTS: Growth curves using M-9 minimal medium containing 40 mM selenite and 1 mM sulfate showed that Enterobacter sp. YSU grew when L-cysteine was present but died when it was absent. Differential protein expression analysis by two dimensional gel electrophoresis showed that CysK was present in cultures containing selenite and lacking L-cysteine but absent in cultures containing both selenite and L-cysteine. Additional RT-PCR studies demonstrated that transcripts for the sulfate permease genes, cysA, cysT and cysW, were down-regulated in the presence of L-cysteine. CONCLUSION: L-cysteine appeared to confer selenite resistance upon Enterobacter sp. YSU by decreasing the level of selenite transport into the cell through the non-specific pathway.
RESUMO
The Y-12 plant in Oak Ridge, TN, which manufactured nuclear weapons during World War II and the Cold War, contaminated East Fork Poplar Creek with heavy metals. The multimetal resistant bacterial strain, Stenotrophomonas maltophilia Oak Ridge strain O2 (S. maltophilia O2), was isolated from East Fork Poplar Creek. Sequence analysis of 16s rDNA suggested that our working strain of S. maltophilia O2 was a strain of Enterobacter. Phylogenetic tree analysis and biochemical tests confirmed that it belonged to an Enterobacter species. This new strain was named Enterobacter sp. YSU. Using a modified R3A growth medium, R3A-Tris, the Hg(II), Cd(II), Zn(II), Cu(II), Au(III), Cr(VI), Ag(I), As(III), and Se(IV) MICs for a confirmed strain of S. maltophilia O2 were 0.24, 0.33, 5, 5, 0.25, 7, 0.03, 14, and 40 mM, respectively, compared to 0.07, 0.24, 0.8, 3, 0.05, 0.4, 0.08, 14, and 40 mM, respectively, for Enterobacter sp. YSU. Although S. maltophilia O2 was generally more metal resistant than Enterobacter sp. YSU, in comparison to Escherichia coli strain HB101, Enterobacter sp. YSU was resistant to Hg(II), Cd(II), Zn(II), Au(III), Ag(I), As(III), and Se(IV). By studying metal resistances in these two strains, it may be possible to understand what makes one microorganism more metal resistant than another microorganism. This work also provided benchmark MICs that can be used to evaluate the metal resistance properties of other bacterial isolates from East Fork Poplar Creek and other metal contaminated sites.