Functional analysis of phenazine biosynthesis genes in Burkholderia spp.

Phenazines contribute to competitiveness, biofilm formation, and virulence in the opportunistic pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa, but knowledge of their diversity, biosynthesis, and biological functions in Burkholderia is lacking. To bridge this gap, we focused on phenazine pathways of B. lata and related species of worldwide origin. Most Phz+ strains were members of the B. cepacia (Bcc) complex, but the capacity to synthesize phenazines was also present among isolates of the B. pseudomallei clade and the plant pathogen B. glumae. Our findings also suggest that the phenazine biosynthetic pathway in Burkholderia has a complex evolutionary history, which likely involved horizontal gene transfers among several distantly related groups of organisms.