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Journal of Virology, October 2002, p. 9695-9701, Vol. 76, No. 19
0022-538X/02/$04.00+0     DOI: 10.1128/JVI.76.19.9695-9701.2002
Copyright © 2002, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Phylogenetic and Functional Analysis of the Bacteriophage P1 Single-Stranded DNA-Binding Protein

Jannick Dyrløv Bendtsen,1 Anders S. Nilsson,2 and Hansjörg Lehnherr3*

Department of Genetics and Biochemistry, Institute of Microbiology, Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universität Greifswald, D-17487 Greifswald, Germany;,3 Center for Biological Sequence Analysis, The Technical University of Denmark, DK-2800 Lyngby, Denmark,1 Department of Genetics, University of Stockholm, S-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden2

Received 11 March 2002/ Accepted 3 July 2002

Bacteriophage P1 encodes a single-stranded DNA-binding protein (SSB-P1), which shows 66% amino acid sequence identity to the SSB protein of the host bacterium Escherichia coli. A phylogenetic analysis indicated that the P1 ssb gene coexists with its E. coli counterpart as an independent unit and does not represent a recent acquirement of the phage. The P1 and E. coli SSB proteins are fully functionally interchangeable. SSB-P1 is nonessential for phage growth in an exponentially growing E. coli host, and it is sufficient to promote bacterial growth in the absence of the E. coli SSB protein. Expression studies showed that the P1 ssb gene is transcribed only, in an rpoS-independent fashion, during stationary-phase growth in E. coli. Mixed infection experiments demonstrated that a wild-type phage has a selective advantage over an ssb-null mutant when exposed to a bacterial host in the stationary phase. These results reconciled the observed evolutionary conservation with the seemingly redundant presence of ssb genes in many bacteriophages and conjugative plasmids.

* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Department of Genetics and Biochemistry, Institute of Microbiology, Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universität Greifswald, Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahnstrasse 15a, D-17487 Greifswald, Germany. Phone: 49 (0) 3834 86 41 53. Fax: 49 (0) 3834 86 41 72. E-mail: lehnherr{at}mail.uni-greifswald.de.

Journal of Virology, October 2002, p. 9695-9701, Vol. 76, No. 19
0022-538X/02/$04.00+0     DOI: 10.1128/JVI.76.19.9695-9701.2002
Copyright © 2002, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.



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