Halobacterium growth

We report detailed characterization of physiological changes encoded by 63% of all genes within the archaeon Halobacterium salinarum subsp. NRC-1 during routine laboratory growth. While the majority of these changes occur during the transition from rapid exponential growth to the stationary phase, we were also able to detect transient changes in gene expression. This demonstrated the presence of several additional albeit subtle physiological states that exist beyond what might be anticipated from a direct interpretation of the growth profile. Changes in the abundance of several key intracellular metabolites over the growth curve corroborated observations of changes in gene expression of enzymes that catalyze their synthesis. Next, we investigated the roles of general transcription factors (GTFs) in mediating these global growth-associated gene expression changes. This revealed numerous phenotypic perturbations including slowed growth, gas vesicle biogenesis deficiency and morphologic abnormalities upon the overexpression of a single GTF - TBPd. These phenotypes were quantified and were attributed to a perturbation in the regulation of aconitase. Importantly, our results demonstrate why an experiment design as simple as a simple batch culture can be enormously informative of activities and interrelationships of a large fraction of all genes in a microbe. This SuperSeries is composed of the SubSeries listed below. Refer to individual Series