Authors: Alla Gagarinova, Ali Hosseinnia, Matineh Rahmatbakhsh, Zoe Istace, Sadhna Phanse, Mohamed Taha Moutaoufik, Mara Zilocchi, Qingzhou Zhang, Hiroyuki Aoki, Matthew Jessulat, Sunyoung Kim, Khaled A. Aly, Mohan Babu
Published: 2022-07-14
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-31819-x
Source: Full article
AbstractBacterial transcription factors (TFs) are widely studied inEscherichia coli. Yet it remains unclear how individual genes in the underlying pathways of TF machinery operate together during environmental challenge. Here, we address this by applying an unbiased, quantitative synthetic genetic interaction (GI) approach to measure pairwise GIs among all TF genes inE. coliunder auxotrophic (rich medium) and prototrophic (minimal medium) static growth conditions. The resulting static and differential GI networks reveal condition-dependent GIs, widespread changes among TF genes in metabolism, and new roles for uncharacterized TFs (yjdC,yneJ,ydiP) as regulators of cell division, putrescine utilization pathway, and cold shock adaptation. Pan-bacterial conservation suggests TF genes with GIs are co-conserved in evolution. Together, our results illuminate the global organization ofE. coliTFs, and remodeling of genetic backup systems for TFs under environmental change, which is essential for controlling the bacterial transcriptional regulatory circuits.