Document Type

Article

Publication Date

7-19-2018

Publication Title

Viruses

Volume

10

Issue

7

First page number:

1

Last page number:

29

Abstract

The antibiotic-resistant bacterium Paenibacillus larvae is the causative agent of American foulbrood (AFB), currently the most destructive bacterial disease in honeybees. Phages that infect P. larvae were isolated as early as the 1950s, but it is only in recent years that P. larvae phage genomes have been sequenced and annotated. In this study we analyze the genomes of all 48 currently sequenced P. larvae phage genomes and classify them into four clusters and a singleton. The majority of P. larvaephage genomes are in the 38–45 kbp range and use the cohesive ends (cos) DNA-packaging strategy, while a minority have genomes in the 50–55 kbp range that use the direct terminal repeat (DTR) DNA-packaging strategy. The DTR phages form a distinct cluster, while the cos phages form three clusters and a singleton. Putative functions were identified for about half of all phage proteins. Structural and assembly proteins are located at the front of the genome and tend to be conserved within clusters, whereas regulatory and replication proteins are located in the middle and rear of the genome and are not conserved, even within clusters. All P. larvae phage genomes contain a conserved N-acetylmuramoyl-l-alanine amidase that serves as an endolysin.

Keywords

American foulbrood; Bacteriophages; Comparative genomics; Large terminase; Major capsid protein; N-acetylmuramoyl-L-alanine amidase; Paenibacillus larvae

Disciplines

Bacteriology | Genomics

File Format

pdf

File Size

5.814 Kb

Language

English

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

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