| Title | A Novel Retron of Vibrio parahaemolyticus Is Closely Related to Retron-Vc95 of Vibrio cholerae |
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| Author | Toshi Shimamoto1, Ashraf M. Ahmed2, and Tadashi Shimamoto1* |
| Address | 1Laboratory of Food Microbiology and Hygiene, Graduate School of Biosphere Science, Hiroshima University, Higashi-Hiroshima 739-8528, Japan, 2Department of Bacteriology, Mycology and Immunology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Kafrelsheikh University, Kafr El-Sheikh 33516, Egypt |
| Bibliography | Journal of Microbiology, 51(3),323-328, 2013, |
| DOI | 10.1007/s12275-013-2715-7 |
| Key Words | reverse transcriptase, msDNA, pathogenic bacteria, vibrios |
| Abstract | Some bacteria produce a satellite RNA-DNA complex termed msDNA, multicopy single-stranded DNA. In this report, msDNA from Vibrio parahaemolyticus, a cause of acute gastroenteritis, was identified and named msDNA-Vp96. The retron element containing the ret gene, encoding the reverse transcriptase (RT) that is responsible for msDNA production, was cloned and characterized. Comparison of msDNAVp96 and msDNA-Vc95, from Vibrio cholerae, showed a high level of sequence similarity. We exchanged the two ret genes to examine whether msDNA was produced by the RT from different sources. We found that RT-Vp96 of V. parahaemolyticus was able to synthesize msDNA-Vc95 of V. cholerae and vice versa. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report that RT from different bacterial species can synthesize msDNA. |