TY - JOUR
T1 - Pyocyanin restricts social cheating in Pseudomonas aeruginosa
AU - Castañeda-Tamez, Paulina
AU - Ramírez-Peris, Jimena
AU - Pérez-Velázquez, Judith
AU - Kuttler, Christina
AU - Jalalimanesh, Ammar
AU - Saucedo-Mora, Miguel
AU - Jiménez-Cortés, J. Guillermo
AU - Maeda, Toshinari
AU - González, Yael
AU - Tomás, María
AU - Wood, Thomas K.
AU - García-Contreras, Rodolfo
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank Dr. Frederick Ausubel from the Harvard Medical School and Dr. You-Hee Cho from the College of Pharmacy, CHA University, South Korea for the PA14 strains. We are grateful for the help of Abigail González-Valdez with the transfection of the phzM mutation. RG-C thanks Beatriz Meraz-Rios, Yahira Katherine Porras Hernandez, Berenice Perez-Eretza, and Dánae Díaz Ramírez for their assistance with some experiments. In addition, we are also grateful for the insights and inspiration provided by our dear colleague Prof. Burkard Hense (who sadly passed away last year). He was very involved at the initial stages of this project; this manuscript honors his memory. This work was supported by grants from PAPIIT UNAM No. IA201116, PAPIIT UNAM IN 214218, and Projects for Solving National Problems/CONACyT Mexico No. 2015-01-402 for RG-C, and by the Army Research Office (W911NF-14-1-0279) to TW, and PI16/01163, awarded to MT within the State Plan for R+D+I 2013-2016 (National Plan for Scientific Research, Technological Development and Innovation 2008-2011) and co-financed by the ISCIII-Deputy General Directorate of evaluation and Promotion of Research-European Regional Development Fund "A way of Making Europe" and Instituto de Salud Carlos III FEDER, Spanish Network for the Research in Infectious Diseases (REIPI, RD16/0016/0001 and RD16/0016/0006) as well as the Study Group on Mechanisms of Action and Resistance to Antimicrobials, GEMARA (SEIMC, http://www.seimc.org/). MT was financially supported by the Miguel Servet Research Program (SERGAS and ISCIII). AJ thanks DAAD (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst), for funding his stay at Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany. TW is the Biotechnology Endowed Chair at the Pennsylvania State University.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 Castañeda-Tamez, Ramírez-Peris, Pérez-Velázquez, Kuttler, Jalalimanesh, Saucedo-Mora, Jiménez-Cortés, Maeda, González, Tomás, Wood and García-Contreras.
PY - 2018/6/27
Y1 - 2018/6/27
N2 - Quorum sensing (QS) in Pseudomonas aeruginosa coordinates the expression of virulence factors, such as exoproteases and siderophores, that are public goods utilized by the whole population of bacteria, regardless of whether they invested or not in their production. These public goods can be used by QS defective mutants for growth, and since these mutants do not contribute to public goods production, they are considered social cheaters. Pyocyanin is a phenazine that is a toxic, QS-controlled metabolite produced by P. aeruginosa. It is a redox-active compound and promotes the generation of reactive oxygen species; it also possesses antibacterial properties and increases fitness in competition with other bacterial species. Since QS-deficient individuals are less able to tolerate oxidative stress, we hypothesized that the pyocyanin produced by the wild-type population could promote selection of functional QS systems in this bacterium. Here, we demonstrate, using competition experiments and mathematical models, that, indeed, pyocyanin increases the fitness of the cooperative QS-proficient individuals and restricts the appearance of social cheaters. In addition, we also show that pyocyanin is able to select QS in other bacteria such as Acinetobacter baumannii.
AB - Quorum sensing (QS) in Pseudomonas aeruginosa coordinates the expression of virulence factors, such as exoproteases and siderophores, that are public goods utilized by the whole population of bacteria, regardless of whether they invested or not in their production. These public goods can be used by QS defective mutants for growth, and since these mutants do not contribute to public goods production, they are considered social cheaters. Pyocyanin is a phenazine that is a toxic, QS-controlled metabolite produced by P. aeruginosa. It is a redox-active compound and promotes the generation of reactive oxygen species; it also possesses antibacterial properties and increases fitness in competition with other bacterial species. Since QS-deficient individuals are less able to tolerate oxidative stress, we hypothesized that the pyocyanin produced by the wild-type population could promote selection of functional QS systems in this bacterium. Here, we demonstrate, using competition experiments and mathematical models, that, indeed, pyocyanin increases the fitness of the cooperative QS-proficient individuals and restricts the appearance of social cheaters. In addition, we also show that pyocyanin is able to select QS in other bacteria such as Acinetobacter baumannii.
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UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85049060989&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.3389/fmicb.2018.01348
DO - 10.3389/fmicb.2018.01348
M3 - Article
C2 - 29997585
AN - SCOPUS:85049060989
SN - 1664-302X
VL - 9
JO - Frontiers in Microbiology
JF - Frontiers in Microbiology
IS - JUN
M1 - 1348
ER -