Open AccessTn5041: a chimeric mercury resistance transposon closely related to the toluene degradative transposon Tn4651
Author(s) -
Gennady Kholodii,
Olga Yurieva,
Ж. М. Горленко,
S. Z. Mindlin,
I. A. Bass,
O. L. Lomovskay,
Alexandra V. Kopteva,
Vadim Nikiforov
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
microbiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.019
H-Index - 179
eISSN - 1465-2080
pISSN - 1350-0872
DOI - 10.1099/00221287-143-8-2549
Subject(s) - transposable element , transposase , tn3 transposon , genetics , biology , operon , insertion sequence , inverted repeat , gene , retrotransposon , genome , escherichia coli
Summary: This paper reports the discovery and characterization of Tn 5041 , a novel-type transposon vehicle for dissemination of mercury resistance in natural bacterial populations. Tn 5041 (14876 bp), identified in a Pseudomonas strain from a mercury mine, is a Tn3 family mercury resistance transposon far outside the Tn 21 subgroup. As in other Tn3 family transposons, Tn 5041 duplicates 5 bp of the target sequence following insertion. Tn 5041 apparently acquired its mer operon as a single-ended relic of a transposon belonging to the classical mercury resistance transposons of the Tn 21 subgroup. The putative transposase and the 47 bp terminal inverted repeats of Tn 5041 are closely related to those of the toluene degradative transposon Tn 4651 and fall into a distinct subgroup on the fringe of the Tn 3 family. The amino acid sequence of the putative resolvase of Tn 5041 resembles site-specific recombinases of the integrase family. Besides the mer operon and putative transposition genes, Tn 5041 contains a 4 kb region that accommodates a number of apparently defective genes and mobile elements.