A unique cell division protein critical for the assembly of the bacterial divisome.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 39361022.
- Also identified by DOI 10.7554/eLife.87922 and PMC identifier 11449484.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Identification of unique essential bacterial genes is important for not only the understanding of their cell biology but also the development of new antimicrobials. Here, we report a previously unrecognized core component of the <i>Acinetobacter baumannii</i> divisome. Our results reveal that the protein, termed Aeg1 interacts with multiple cell division proteins, including FtsN, which is required for components of the divisome to localize to the midcell. We demonstrate that the FtsA<sub>E202K</sub> and FtsB<sub>E65A</sub> mutants effectively bypassed the need of Aeg1 by <i>A. baumannii</i>, as did the activation variants FtsW<sub>M254I</sub> and FtsW<sub>S274G</sub>. Our results suggest that Aeg1 is a cell division protein that arrives at the division site to initiate cell division by recruiting FtsN, which activates FtsQLB and FtsA to induce the septal peptidoglycan synthase FtsWI. The discovery of the new essential cell division protein has provided a new target for the development of antibacterial agents.
Medical subject headings
- Cell Division
- Bacterial Proteins
- Acinetobacter baumannii