Document Type
Article
Publication Date
4-2014
Abstract
Vibrio cholerae is a Gram-negative bacterial pathogen that consists of over 200 serogroups with differing pathogenic potential. Only strains that express the virulence factors cholera toxin (CT) and toxin-coregulated pilus (TCP) are capable of pandemic spread of cholera diarrhoea. Regardless, all V. cholerae strains sequenced to date harbour genes for the type VI secretion system (T6SS) that translocates effectors into neighbouring eukaryotic and prokaryotic cells. Here we report that the effectors encoded within these conserved gene clusters differ widely among V. cholerae strains, and that immunity proteins encoded immediately downstream from the effector genes protect their host from neighbouring bacteria producing corresponding effectors. As a consequence, strains with matching effector-immunity gene sets can coexist, while strains with different sets compete against each other. Thus, the V. cholerae T6SS contributes to the competitive behaviour of this species.
Recommended Citation
Unterweger, D., Miyata, S. T., Bachmann, V., Brooks, T. M., Mullins, T., Kostiuk, B., Provenzano, D., & Pukatzki, S. (2014). The Vibrio cholerae type VI secretion system employs diverse effector modules for intraspecific competition. Nature communications, 5, 3549. https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms4549
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
Publication Title
Nature Communications
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms4549
Comments
Copyright © 2014, Nature Publishing Group, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited. All Rights Reserved.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/