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A Chimeric Siderophore Halts Swarming Vibrio
Author(s) -
Böttcher Thomas,
Clardy Jon
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
angewandte chemie international edition
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.831
H-Index - 550
eISSN - 1521-3773
pISSN - 1433-7851
DOI - 10.1002/anie.201310729
Subject(s) - swarming (honey bee) , vibrio alginolyticus , siderophore , biology , vibrio , swarm behaviour , microbiology and biotechnology , swarming motility , chimera (genetics) , gene cluster , gene , chromobacterium violaceum , bacteria , virulence , genetics , quorum sensing , ecology
Some bacteria swarm under some circumstances; they move rapidly and collectively over a surface. In an effort to understand the molecular signals controlling swarming, we isolated two bacterial strains from the same red seaweed, Vibrio alginolyticus B522, a vigorous swarmer, and Shewanella algae B516, which inhibits V. alginolyticus swarming in its vicinity. Plate assays combined with NMR, MS, and X‐ray diffraction analyses identified a small molecule, which was named avaroferrin, as a potent swarming inhibitor. Avaroferrin, a previously unreported cyclic dihydroxamate siderophore, is a chimera of two well‐known siderophores: putrebactin and bisucaberin. The sequenced genome of S. algae revealed avaroferrin’s biosynthetic gene cluster to be a mashup of putrebactin and bisucaberin biosynthetic genes. Avaroferrin blocks swarming through its ability to bind iron in a form that cannot be pirated by V. alginolyticus , thereby securing this essential resource for its producer.