Genomic Analysis Of Ralstonia Solanasearum

Ralstonia solanacearum is a devastating, soil-borne plant pathogen with a globaldistribution and an unusually wide host range. It is a model system for the dissectionof molecular determinants governing pathogenicity.We analyzed the Ralstonia solanacearum genome using ZCURVE, Glimmer, andZplotter etc. The 5.8-megabase (Mb) high G+C genome is organized into tworeplicons: a 3.7-Mb chromosome and a 2.1-Mb megaplasmid. Both replicons have amosaic structure providing evidence for the acquisition of genes through horizontalgene transfer.In order to analyze the type III secretion system of Ralstonia solanacearum andany other Gram-negative bacteria, we constructed a database named The Database ofType III Secretion System (DTTSS). It is available in the website(http://sdbi.sdut.edu.cn/ttss/) and can be accessed freely. In DTTSS, the type IIIsecretion apparatus and flagellar proteins of Gram-negative bacteria are classified indifferent orthologous groups. Each protein is recorded with gene name, sourcebacterium, definition, class, gene sequence, amino acid sequence, etc. Some proteins'3D-structure information is shown in Structure page and can be downloaded freely.What's more, users can search any records with different keywords and can align anyprotein or gene sequences in the Blast page.Predicted highly expressed (PHX) genes are comparatively analyzed forRalstonia solanacearum and five other GC-rich Gram-negative phytopathogens, i.e.Agrobacterium tumefaciens, Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris (Xcc),Xanthomonas axonopodis pv. citri (Xac), Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato andXylella fastidiosa. Enzymes involved in energy metabolism, such as ATP synthase,and genes involved in TCA cycle, are PHX in most bacteria except X. fastidiosa,which prefers an anaerobic environment. Most pathogenicity-related factors, includingflagellar proteins and some outer membrane proteins, are PHX, except that flagellar...