Yersinia pestis KIM10+ Transcriptome or Gene expression. Yersinia pestis KIM10+

Yersinia pestis, the bacterial etiological agent of bubonic plague is transmitted to mammals by infected fleas. Within the flea, Y. pestis exhibits a distinct life stage which is characterized by its temporal growth and development into an adherent biofilm that promotes transmission. Growth and development of the biofilm is a process that is supported by nutritional status of the flea digestive tract. While in previous studies the whole genome coding-gene expression profile of Y. pestis in fleas has been able to shed light on metabolic adaptation that this bacterium undergoes, these processes are thought to be regulated at a second order post-transcriptional level that dictates protein levels required for metabolic adaptation. In this study, we used RNAseq of the small non-coding RNA population to determine the sRNA-ome of Y. pestis in infective fleas with the long term goal being to discover post-transcriptional regulators involved in Y. pestis adaptation to the digestive tract of its flea vector. This is significant because factors that support Y. pestis adaptation and infectivity of the flea gut are potential biological targets to disrupt this process and limit transmission of the plague organism.