Comparative transcriptional analysis of Acinetobacter baumannii strain ATCC 17978 and strain 17978hm

In this study the transcriptomes of Acinetobacter baumannii strains ATCC 17978 and 17978hm were compared. Strain 17978hm is a hns knockout derivative of strain ATCC 17978. Strain 17978hm displays a hyper-motile phenotype on semi-solid Mueller-Hinton (MH) media (0.25% agar). ATCC 17978 and 17978hm from an 37C overnight culture were transferred to the centre of the semi-solid MH plate and incubated at 37C for 8 hours. Only 17978hm cells displayed a motile phenotype and covered the complete surface of the plate. These motile 17978hm cells and the non-motile wild-type ATCC 17978 cells were harvested and RNA was isolated. The comparative transcriptome analysis was performed using the FairPlay labeling kit and a custom made Agilent MicroArray with probes designed to coding regions of the ATCC 17978 genome. The data was analyzed using Agilent GeneSpring GX9 and the significance analysis of microarray MS Excel add-on. The motile 17978hm cells and the non-motile wild-type ATCC 17978 cells were harvested and RNA was isolated. The comparative transcriptome analysis was performedThe probes on the microarray cover all predicted open reading frames (at least 4 per ORF) and additional replicates of housekeeping genes of the A. baumannii ATCC 17978 genome .