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In vivo evolutionary engineering of a boron-resistant bacterium: Bacillus boroniphilus

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Abstract

Boron is an industrially and biologically important element. However, the mechanisms of boron tolerance and its transport in bacteria and many other living systems are still not clearly understood. In this study, the boron resistance level of a boron-tolerant bacterium, Bacillus boroniphilus DSM 17376, was improved up to 300 mmol l−1 boron, by employing an in vivo evolutionary engineering strategy based on batch selection under continuous exposure to gradually increasing boron stress levels. The resistance was heterogeneous within the final mutant population which ranged from about 1- to 16-fold of the wild type resistance at 150 mmol l−1 boron stress level. Boron-resistant mutants had significant cross-resistance to iron and copper stresses, and were also cross-resistant to salt (NaCl) stress, suggesting a common resistance mechanism between these stress types. Additionally, highly boron-resistant mutants had up to 2.8-fold higher boron contents than the wild-type, when exposed to high levels of (150 mmol l−1) continuous boron stress throughout their cultivation. It was shown that evolutionary engineering is a successful approach to significantly increase bacterial boron resistance and investigate the complex mechanism of boron tolerance and transport in microbial systems.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Burcu Turanlı-Yıldız for technical assistance, and Ali Dinler for help with PCA. This work was supported by National Boron Research Institute (BOREN-2008-Ç0180, PI: Z.P. Çakar).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Faculty of Science & Letters, Istanbul Technical University, Istanbul, Maslak, 34469, Turkey

    Mustafa Şen, Ülkü Yılmaz & Z. Petek Çakar

  2. Dr. Orhan Öcalgiray Molecular Biology, Biotechnology & Genetics Research Center, Istanbul Technical University, ITU-MOBGAM, Istanbul, Maslak, 34469, Turkey

    Mustafa Şen, Ülkü Yılmaz & Z. Petek Çakar

  3. Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science & Letters, Istanbul Technical University, Istanbul, Maslak, 34469, Turkey

    Aslı Baysal & Süleyman Akman

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  1. Mustafa Şen
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  2. Ülkü Yılmaz
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  3. Aslı Baysal
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  4. Süleyman Akman
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  5. Z. Petek Çakar
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Correspondence to Z. Petek Çakar.

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Şen, M., Yılmaz, Ü., Baysal, A. et al. In vivo evolutionary engineering of a boron-resistant bacterium: Bacillus boroniphilus . Antonie van Leeuwenhoek 99, 825–835 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10482-011-9557-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10482-011-9557-2

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