Many Gram-negative bacteria regulate gene expression in response to their population size by sensing the level of acyl-homoserine lactone signal molecules which they produce and liberate to the environment. We have developed an assay for these signals that couples separation by thin-layer chromatography with detection using Agrobacterium tumefaciens harboring lacZ fused to a gene that is regulated by autoinduction. With the exception of N-butanoyl-L-homoserine lactone, the reporter detected acyl-homoserine lactones with 3-oxo-, 3-hydroxy-, and 3-unsubstituted side chains of all lengths tested. The intensity of the response was proportional to the amount of the signal molecule chromatographed. Each of the 3-oxo-and the 3-unsubstituted derivatives migrated with a unique mobility. Using the assay, we showed that some bacteria produce as many as five detectable signal molecules. Structures could be assigned tentatively on the basis of mobility and spot shape. The dominant species produced by Pseudomonas syringae pv. tabaci chromatographed with the properties of N-(3-oxohexanoyl)-L-homoserine lactone, a structure that was confirmed by mass spectrometry. An isolate of Pseudomonas fluorescens produced five detectable species, three of which had novel chromatographic properties. These were identified as the 3-hydroxy-forms of N-hexanoyl-, N-octanoyl-, and N-decanoyl-L-homoserine lactone. The assay can be used to screen cultures of bacteria for acyl-homoserine lactones, for quantifying the amounts of these molecules produced, and as an analytical and preparative aid in determining the structures of these signal molecules.

Many gram-negative bacteria regulate expression of specialized gene sets in response to population density. This regulatory mechanism, called autoinduction or quorum-sensing, is based on the production by the bacteria of a small, diffusible signal molecule called the autoinducer. In the most well-studied systems the autoinducers are N-acylated derivatives of L-homoserine lactone (acyl-HSL). Signal specificity is conferred by the length, and the nature of the substitution at C-3, of the acyl side-chain. We evaluated four acyl-HSL bioreporters, based on tra of Agrobacterium tumefaciens, lux of Vibrio fischeri, las of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and pigment production by Chromobacterium violaceum, for their ability to detect sets of 3-oxo acyl-HSLs, 3-hydroxy acyl-HSLs, and alkanoyl-HSLs with chain lengths ranging from C4 to C12. The traG::lacZ fusion reporter from the A. tumefaciens Ti plasmid was the single most sensitive and versatile detector of the four. Using this reporter, we screened 106 isolates representing seven genera of bacteria that associate with plants. Most of the Agrobacterium, Rhizobium, and Pantoea isolates and about half of the Erwinia and Pseudomonas isolates gave positive reactions. Only a few isolates of Xanthomonas produced a detectable signal. We characterized the acyl-HSLs produced by a subset of the isolates by thin-layer chromatography. Among the pseudomonads and erwinias, most produced a single dominant activity chromatographing with the properties of N-(3-oxo-hexanoyl)-L-HSL. However, a few of the erwinias, and the P. fluorescens and Ralstonia solanacearum isolates, produced quite different signals, including 3-hydroxy forms, as well as active compounds that chromatographed with properties unlike any of our standards. The few positive xanthomonas, and almost all of the agrobacteria, produced small amounts of a compound with the chromatographic properties of N-(3-oxo-octanoyl)-L-HSL. Members of the genus Rhizobium showed the greatest diversity, with some producing as few as one and others producing as many as seven detectable signals. Several isolates produced extremely nonpolar compounds indicative of very long acyl side-chains. Production of these compounds suggests that quorum-sensing is common as a gene regulatory mechanism among gram-negative plant-associated bacteria.

Conjugal transfer of Ti plasmids from Agrobacterium donors to bacterial recipients is controlled by two types of diffusible signal molecules. Induction is mediated by novel compounds, called opines, that are secreted by crown gall tumours. These neoplasias result from infection of susceptible plants by virulent agrobacteria. The second diffusible signal, called conjugation factor, is synthesized by the donor bacteria themselves. Production of this factor is induced by the opine. Here we show that conjugation is regulated directly by a transcriptional activator, TraR, which requires conjugation factor as a coinducer to activate tra gene expression. TraR is a homologue of LuxR, the lux gene activator from Vibrio fischeri which also requires an endogenously synthesized diffusible coinducer. The two regulatory systems are related; the two activator proteins show amino-acid sequence similarities and the lux system cofactor, autoinducer, will substitute for conjugation factor in the TraR-dependent activation of Ti plasmid tra genes.

3The nine decades since Smith and Townsend demonstrated that Agrobacterium tumefaciens causes plant tumors (95) have been marked by a series of surprises. Among the most important of these was the report in 1958 that these tumors could be excised and propagated in vitro without exogenous plant hormones (7). Equally important were a series of reports beginning about the same time that tumors released compounds that agrobacteria could use as nutrients (24). Perhaps the most exciting discoveries, reported in the 1970s and 1980s, were that tumorigenesis required the transfer of fragments of oncogenic DNA to infected plant cells (10), that this process evolved from a conjugal transfer system (99), and that the genes that direct this process are expressed in response to host-released chemical signals (47). This DNA transfer process has become a cornerstone of plant molecular genetics. The genus Agrobacterium also has provided excellent models for several aspects of host-pathogen interactions, including intercellular transport of macromolecules (11), bacterial detection of host organisms (47), targeting of proteins to plant cell nuclei (3), and interbacterial chemical signaling via autoinducer-type pheromones (120).Most of the genes required for tumorigenesis are found on large extrachromosomal elements called Ti plasmids. Indeed, transfer of Ti plasmids into certain nonpathogenic bacteria converts them into tumorigenic pathogens (43). Ti plasmids are generally referred to by the types of opines whose catabolism they direct (see below). However, this nomenclature is becoming less satisfactory as we discover that all known Ti plasmids direct the catabolism of more than one opine and that opine catabolic genes are found in a variety of combinations in different plasmids. The Ti plasmids pTiA6NC, pTi15955, pTiAch5, pTiR10, and pTiB6S3, which are widely considered to be functionally identical, are generally referred to as octopine-type Ti plasmids (or, less frequently, octopine, mannityl opine-type Ti plasmids). The DNA sequencing of these plasmids was initiated almost 20 years ago (21) and was recently completed in our three laboratories. The resulting 194,140-nucleotide sequence is a composite assembly of sequences from all of the plasmids listed above. The close similarity of these plasmids is exemplified by the sequence of a 42-kb segment of the vir regions of pTiA6NC and pTi15955. These sequences differ at only one base, and this polymorphism is silent at the amino acid level. We have no evidence for polymorphisms elsewhere except for a large deletion that is unique to pTiA6NC (Fig. 1). The restriction map deduced from this sequence agrees almost perfectly with the published restriction map of pTiAch5 (25). All known and suspected genes are depicted in Fig. 1, and their demonstrated or putative functions are described in Table 1. The DNA sequence of this Ti plasmid provides a useful framework to review the roles of this plasmid in the biology of plant infection and colonization.This Ti plasmid contains 155 open readin...

Renaturation kinetics of labeled Agrobacterium tumefaciens DNA are not influenced by addition of 104-fold excess of crown gall tumor DNA. Reconstruction experiments demonstrated that 0.01% added bacterial DNA produces a detectable increase in rate of renaturation of labeled DNA. Crown gall tumor DNA therefore cannot contain as much as 0.01% A. tumefaciens DNA, (one entire bacterial genome per three diploid tumor cells).By estimated levels range from 0.2% (6, 7) to 0.9% (8). DNA from A. tumefaciens bacteriophage PS8 has been reported present in tumor DNA at a level of 1.8% (8), despite the fact that neither viable PS8 phage nor PS8 DNA could be detected in the bacterial strain which incited the tumor examined. Unfortunately, most of these nucleic acid hybridization studies (5-7, 9) failed to include thermal dissociation profiles of the duplexes, an essential control to support the conclusion that authentic phage or bacterial nucleic acids were detected. Thermal dissociation profiles of bacterial or phage cRNA hybridized to filter-bound tumor DNA (8) have been reported (18)