The formation of polylysogens during infection of Escherichia coli with bacteriophage lambda

Lysis-lysogeny coexistence: prophage integration during lytic development

The infection of Escherichia coli cells by bacteriophage lambda results in bifurcated means of propagation, where the phage decides between the lytic and lysogenic pathways. Although traditionally thought to be mutually exclusive, increasing evidence suggests that this lysis-lysogeny decision is more complex than once believed, but exploring its intricacies requires an improved resolution of study. Here, with a newly developed fluorescent reporter system labeling single phage and E. coli DNAs, these two distinct pathways can be visualized by following the DNA movements in vivo. Surprisingly, we frequently observed an interesting "lyso-lysis" phenomenon in lytic cells, where phage integrates its DNA into the host, a characteristic event of the lysogenic pathway, followed by cell lysis. Furthermore, the frequency of lyso-lysis increases with the number of infecting phages, and specifically, with CII activity. Moreover, in lytic cells, the integration site attB on the E. coli genome migrates toward the polar region over time, leading to more spatial overlap with the phage DNA and frequent colocalization/collision of attB and phage DNA, possibly contributing to a higher chance for DNA integration.

Improved plasmid-based system for fully regulated off-to-on gene expression in Escherichia coli: application to production of toxic proteins

In previous work transduction of Escherichia coli with phage λ particles carrying packaged plasmids was shown to provide complete off-to-on expression of plasmid-borne genes (Cronan, J.E., 2003. J. Bacteriol. 185, 6522-6529). The plasmids used contained the phage λcos site (and hence are cosmids) and were very efficiently packaged into λ phage particles in vivo upon induction of λ lysogens having an inactivated cos site. However, a shortcoming was that the stocks contained a variable fraction of infectious λ phage which arose by recombinational repair of the inactive cos site. I report that the construction of E. coli strains that eliminate the background of infectious phage and show that the system can be utilized to express proteins by the phage T7 RNA polymerase/pET vector system.

Circular dimers of a lambda DNA in infected, nonlysogenic Escherichia coli

Covalently closed circular dimers of phage lambda DNA have been found in Escherichia coli infected with lambda. These dimers can be formed by either the lambda Red or Int systems, by a nonrecombinational replicative mechanism requiring the activity of the lambda O and P genes or by joining of the cohesive ends. Dimers mediated by the E. coli Rec system have not been observed. Those formed by the Int system often result from recombination between different DNA molecules; however, the Red-mediated dimers may be a result of replicative extension of a single DNA molecule. Trimers have also been observed but studied only briefly.