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Lookup NU author(s): Elliot Macdonald, Dr James ConnollyORCiD, Professor Henrik Strahl von SchultenORCiD, Dr Giusy MarianoORCiD
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Competitive bacteria-bacteriophage interactions have resulted in the evolution of a plethora of bacterial defense systems preventing phage propagation. In recent years, computational and bioinformatic approaches have underpinned the discovery of numerous novel bacterial defense systems. Anti-phage systems are frequently encoded together in genomic loci termed defense islands. Here we report the identification and characterisation of a novel anti-phage system, that we have termed Shield, which forms part of the Pseudomonas defensive arsenal. The Shield system comprises the core component ShdA, a membrane-bound protein harboring an RmuC domain. Heterologous production of ShdA alone is sufficient to mediate bacterial immunity against several phages. We demonstrate that Shield and ShdA confer population-level immunity and that they can also decrease transformation efficiency. We further show that ShdA homologues can degrade DNA in vitro and, when expressed in a heterologous host, can alter the organisation of the host chromosomal DNA. Use of comparative genomic approaches identified how Shield can be divided into four subtypes, three of which contain additional components that in some cases can negatively affect the activity of ShdA and/or provide additional lines of phage defense. Collectively, our results identify a new player within the Pseudomonas bacterial immunity arsenal that displays a novel mechanism of protection, and reveals a role for RmuC domains in phage defense.
Author(s): Macdonald E, Wright R, Connolly JPR, Strahl H, Brockhurst M, van Houte S, Blower TR, Palmer T, Mariano G
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: PLOS Genetics
Year: 2023
Volume: 19
Issue: 6
Pages: e1010784
Online publication date: 05/06/2023
Acceptance date: 12/05/2023
Date deposited: 04/06/2023
ISSN (electronic): 1553-7404
Publisher: Public Library of Science
URL: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgen.1010784
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1010784
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