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Lookup NU author(s): Dr Kevin WhitleyORCiD, James GrimshawORCiD, Dr David Roberts, Dr Eleni Karinou, Dr Seamus Holden
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Bacterial cell division requires septal peptidoglycan (sPG) synthesis by the divisome complex. Treadmilling of the essential tubulin homologue FtsZ has been implicated in septal constriction, though its precise role remains unclear. Here, we used live-cell single-molecule imaging of the divisome transpeptidase PBP2B to investigate sPG synthesis dynamics in Bacillus subtilis. In contrast to previous models, we observed a single population of processively-moving PBP2B molecules whose motion is driven by peptidoglycan synthesis and is not associated with FtsZ treadmilling. However, despite the asynchronous motions of PBP2B and FtsZ, a partial dependence of PBP2B processivity on FtsZ treadmilling was observed. Additionally, through single-molecule counting experiments we provide evidence that the divisome synthesis complex is multimeric. Our results support a model for B. subtilis division where a multimeric synthesis complex follows a single track dependent on sPG synthesis whose activity and dynamics are asynchronous with FtsZ treadmilling.
Author(s): Whitley KD, Grimshaw J, Roberts DM, Karinou E, Stansfeld PJ, Holden S
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Nature Microbiology
Year: 2024
Volume: 9
Pages: 1064–1074
Print publication date: 01/04/2024
Online publication date: 13/03/2024
Acceptance date: 23/02/2024
Date deposited: 23/02/2024
ISSN (electronic): 2058-5276
Publisher: Nature
URL: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41564-024-01650-9
DOI: 10.1038/s41564-024-01650-9
Data Access Statement: The sequences for performing protein structure predictions were downloaded from the UniProtKB database (Q07868 (PBP2B); Q07867 (FtsL); O07639 (FtsW); P16655 (DivIB); P37471 (DivIC)). Source data for all figures presented in the paper and Supplementary Information, as well as representative raw video data, are available at https://doi.org/10.25405/data.ncl.c.7078312 ref. Code availability Custom software is available on the Whitley lab GitHub page or Zenodo at https://github.com/WhitleyLab/Vercini_spt_analysis ref.
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