A defect in cell wall recycling confers antibiotic resistance and sensitivity in Staphylococcus aureus.

WalKR is a two-component system that is essential for viability in Gram-positive bacteria that regulates the all-important autolysins. Here we show a T101M mutation in walR confers a defect in autolysis, a thickened cell wall and decreased sensitivity to antibiotics that target the lipid II cycle, a phenotype that is reminiscent of the clinical resistance form known as vancomycin intermediate-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. Importantly, this is accompanied by dramatic sensitization to tunicamycin. We demonstrate that this phenotype is due to partial collapse of a pathway consisting of autolysins, AtlA and Sle1, a transmembrane sugar permease, MurP, and GlcNAc recycling enzymes, MupG and MurQ. We suggest that this causes a shortage of substrate for MraY causing it to be hypersensitive to competitive inhibition by tunicamycin. This constitutes a new molecular model for antibiotic sensitivity in S. aureus and a promising new route for antibiotic discovery. Comparative gene expression profiling analysis of RNA-seq data Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 29213 (wild type), walR1 and walR1-walK(tun)