Proteome-wide identification of lysine succinylation in thermophilic and mesophilic bacteria

Stress-induced nucleoid remodeling in Deinococcus radiodurans is associated with major changes in Heat Unstable (HU) protein dynamics

Bacteria have developed a wide range of strategies to respond to stress, one of which is the rapid large-scale reorganization of their nucleoid. Nucleoid associated proteins (NAPs) are believed to be major actors in nucleoid remodeling, but the details of this process remain poorly understood. Here, using the radiation resistant bacterium D. radiodurans as a model, and advanced fluorescence microscopy, we examined the changes in nucleoid morphology and volume induced by either entry into stationary phase or exposure to UV-C light, and characterized the associated changes in mobility of the major NAP in D. radiodurans, the heat-unstable (HU) protein. While both types of stress induced nucleoid compaction, HU diffusion was reduced in stationary phase cells, but was instead increased following exposure to UV-C, suggesting distinct underlying mechanisms. Furthermore, we show that UV-C-induced nucleoid remodeling involves a rapid nucleoid condensation step associated with increased HU diffusion, followed by a slower decompaction phase to restore normal nucleoid morphology and HU dynamics, before cell division can resume. These findings shed light on the diversity of nucleoid remodeling processes in bacteria and underline the key role of HU in regulating this process through changes in its mode of assembly on DNA.

Recent Contributions of Proteomics to Our Understanding of Reversible Nε-Lysine Acylation in Bacteria

Post-translational modifications (PTMs) have been extensively studied in both eukaryotes and prokaryotes. Lysine acetylation, originally thought to be a rare occurrence in bacteria, is now recognized as a prevalent and important PTM in more than 50 species. This expansion in interest in bacterial PTMs became possible with the advancement of mass spectrometry technology and improved reagents such as acyl-modification specific antibodies. In this Review, we discuss how mass spectrometry-based proteomic studies of lysine acetylation and other acyl modifications have contributed to our understanding of bacterial physiology, focusing on recently published studies from 2018 to 2023. We begin with a discussion of approaches used to study bacterial PTMs. Next, we discuss newly characterized acylomes, including acetylomes, succinylomes, and malonylomes, in different bacterial species. In addition, we examine proteomic contributions to our understanding of bacterial virulence and biofilm formation. Finally, we discuss the contributions of mass spectrometry to our understanding of the mechanisms of acetylation, both enzymatic and nonenzymatic. We end with a discussion of the current state of the field and possible future research avenues to explore.

The roles of nucleoid-associated proteins and topoisomerases in chromosome structure, strand segregation, and the generation of phenotypic heterogeneity in bacteria

How to adapt to a changing environment is a fundamental, recurrent problem confronting cells. One solution is for cells to organize their constituents into a limited number of spatially extended, functionally relevant, macromolecular assemblies or hyperstructures, and then to segregate these hyperstructures asymmetrically into daughter cells. This asymmetric segregation becomes a particularly powerful way of generating a coherent phenotypic diversity when the segregation of certain hyperstructures is with only one of the parental DNA strands and when this pattern of segregation continues over successive generations. Candidate hyperstructures for such asymmetric segregation in prokaryotes include those containing the nucleoid-associated proteins (NAPs) and the topoisomerases. Another solution to the problem of creating a coherent phenotypic diversity is by creating a growth-environment-dependent gradient of supercoiling generated along the replication origin-to-terminus axis of the bacterial chromosome. This gradient is modulated by transcription, NAPs, and topoisomerases. Here, we focus primarily on two topoisomerases, TopoIV and DNA gyrase in Escherichia coli, on three of its NAPs (H-NS, HU, and IHF), and on the single-stranded binding protein, SSB. We propose that the combination of supercoiling-gradient-dependent and strand-segregation-dependent topoisomerase activities result in significant differences in the supercoiling of daughter chromosomes, and hence in the phenotypes of daughter cells.

An emerging field: Post-translational modification in microbiome

Post-translational modifications (PTMs) play an essential role in most biological processes. PTMs on human proteins have been extensively studied. Studies on bacterial PTMs are emerging, which demonstrate that bacterial PTMs are different from human PTMs in their types, mechanisms and functions. Few PTM studies have been done on the microbiome. Here, we reviewed several studied PTMs in bacteria including phosphorylation, acetylation, succinylation, glycosylation, and proteases. We discussed the enzymes responsible for each PTM and their functions. We also summarized the current methods used to study microbiome PTMs and the observations demonstrating the roles of PTM in the microbe-microbe interactions within the microbiome and their interactions with the environment or host. Although new methods and tools for PTM studies are still needed, the existing technologies have made great progress enabling a deeper understanding of the functional regulation of the microbiome. Large-scale application of these microbiome-wide PTM studies will provide a better understanding of the microbiome and its roles in the development of human diseases.

Evidence for a Negative Correlation between Human Reactive Enamine-Imine Intermediate Deaminase A (RIDA) Activity and Cell Proliferation Rate: Role of Lysine Succinylation of RIDA

Reactive intermediate deaminase (Rid) proteins are enzymes conserved in all domains of life. UK114, a mammalian member of RidA subfamily, has been firstly identified as a component of liver perchloric acid-soluble proteins (L-PSP). Although still poorly defined, several functions have been attributed to the mammalian protein UK114/RIDA, including the reactive intermediate deamination activity. The expression of UK114/RIDA has been observed in some tumors, arousing interest in this protein as an evaluable tumor marker. However, other studies reported a negative correlation between UK114/RIDA expression, tumor differentiation degree and cell proliferation. This work addressed the question of UK114/RIDA expression in human non-tumor HEK293 cell lines and in some human tumor cell lines. Here we reported that human RIDA (hRIDA) was expressed in all the analyzed cell line and subjected to lysine (K-)succinylation. In HEK293, hRIDA K-succinylation was negatively correlated to the cell proliferation rate and was under the control of SIRT5. Moreover, K-succinylation clearly altered hRIDA quantification by immunoblotting, explaining, at least in part, some discrepancies about RIDA expression reported in previous studies. We found that hRIDA was able to deaminate reactive enamine-imine intermediates and that K-succinylation drastically reduced deaminase activity. As predicted by in silico analysis, the observed reduction of deaminase activity has been related to the drastic alterations of hRIDA structure inferred by K-succinylation. The role of hRIDA and the importance of its K-succinylation in cell metabolism, especially in cancer biology, have been discussed.

Nucleoid Associated Proteins: The Small Organizers That Help to Cope With Stress

The bacterial chromosome must be efficiently compacted to fit inside the small and crowded cell while remaining accessible for the protein complexes involved in replication, transcription, and DNA repair. The dynamic organization of the nucleoid is a consequence of both intracellular factors (i.e., simultaneously occurring cell processes) and extracellular factors (e.g., environmental conditions, stress agents). Recent studies have revealed that the bacterial chromosome undergoes profound topological changes under stress. Among the many DNA-binding proteins that shape the bacterial chromosome structure in response to various signals, NAPs (nucleoid associated proteins) are the most abundant. These small, basic proteins bind DNA with low specificity and can influence chromosome organization under changing environmental conditions (i.e., by coating the chromosome in response to stress) or regulate the transcription of specific genes (e.g., those involved in virulence).

Characterization and Identification of Lysine Succinylation Sites based on Deep Learning Method

Succinylation is a type of protein post-translational modification (PTM), which can play important roles in a variety of cellular processes. Due to an increasing number of site-specific succinylated peptides obtained from high-throughput mass spectrometry (MS), various tools have been developed for computationally identifying succinylated sites on proteins. However, most of these tools predict succinylation sites based on traditional machine learning methods. Hence, this work aimed to carry out the succinylation site prediction based on a deep learning model. The abundance of MS-verified succinylated peptides enabled the investigation of substrate site specificity of succinylation sites through sequence-based attributes, such as position-specific amino acid composition, the composition of k-spaced amino acid pairs (CKSAAP), and position-specific scoring matrix (PSSM). Additionally, the maximal dependence decomposition (MDD) was adopted to detect the substrate signatures of lysine succinylation sites by dividing all succinylated sequences into several groups with conserved substrate motifs. According to the results of ten-fold cross-validation, the deep learning model trained using PSSM and informative CKSAAP attributes can reach the best predictive performance and also perform better than traditional machine-learning methods. Moreover, an independent testing dataset that truly did not exist in the training dataset was used to compare the proposed method with six existing prediction tools. The testing dataset comprised of 218 positive and 2621 negative instances, and the proposed model could yield a promising performance with 84.40% sensitivity, 86.99% specificity, 86.79% accuracy, and an MCC value of 0.489. Finally, the proposed method has been implemented as a web-based prediction tool (CNN-SuccSite), which is now freely accessible at http://csb.cse.yzu.edu.tw/CNN-SuccSite/.

Enrichments of post-translational modifications in proteomic studies

More than 300 different protein post-translational modifications are currently known, but only a few have been extensively investigated because modified proteoforms are commonly present in sub-stoichiometry amount. For this reason, improvement of specific enrichment techniques is particularly useful for the proteomic characterization of post-translationally modified proteins. Enrichment proteomic strategies could help the researcher in the challenging issue to decipher the complex molecular cross-talk existing between the different factors influencing the cellular pathways. In this review the state of art of the platforms applied for the enrichment of specific and most common post-translational modifications, such as glycosylation and glycation, phosphorylation, sulfation, redox modifications (i.e. sulfydration and nitrosylation), methylation, acetylation, and ubiquitinylation, are described. Enrichments strategies applied to characterize less studied post-translational modifications are also briefly discussed.

Protein acetylation on 2-isopropylmalate synthase from Thermus thermophilus HB27

Protein lysine N^ε-acetylation is one of the important factors regulating cellular metabolism. We performed a proteomic analysis to identify acetylated proteins in the extremely thermophilic bacterium, Thermus thermophilus HB27. A total of 335 unique acetylated lysine residues, including many metabolic enzymes and ribosomal proteins, were identified in 208 proteins. Enzymes involved in amino acid metabolism were the most abundant among acetylated metabolic proteins. 2-Isopropylmalate synthase (IPMS), which catalyzes the first step in leucine biosynthesis, was acetylated at four lysine residues. Acetylation-mimicking mutations at Lys332 markedly decreased IPMS activity in vitro, suggesting that Lys332, which is located in subdomain II, plays a regulatory role in IPMS activity. We also investigated the acetylation-deacetylation mechanism of IPMS and revealed that it was acetylated non-enzymatically by acetyl-CoA and deacetylated enzymatically by TT_C0104. The present results suggest that leucine biosynthesis is regulated by post-translational protein modifications, in addition to feedback inhibition/repression, and that metabolic enzymes are regulated by protein acetylation in T. thermophilus.

Integrated Succinylome and Metabolome Profiling Reveals Crucial Role of S-Ribosylhomocysteine Lyase in Quorum Sensing and Metabolism of Aeromonas hydrophila

Protein modification by lysine succinylation is a newly identified post-translational modification (PTM) of lysine residues and plays an important role in diverse physiological functions, although their associated biological characteristics are still largely unknown. Here, we investigated the effects of lysine succinylation on the physiological regulation within a well-known fish pathogen, Aeromonas hydrophila A high affinity purification method was used to enrich peptides with lysine succinylation in A. hydrophila ATCC 7966, and a total of 2,174 lysine succinylation sites were identified on 666 proteins using LC-MS/MS. Gene ontology analysis indicated that these succinylated proteins are involved in diverse metabolic pathways and biological processes, including translation, protein export, and central metabolic pathways. The modifications of several selected candidates were further validated by Western blotting. Using site-directed mutagenesis, we observed that the succinylation of lysines on S-ribosylhomocysteine lyase (LuxS) at the K23 and K30 sites positively regulate the production of the quorum sensing autoinducer AI-2, and that these PTMs ultimately alter its competitiveness with another pathogen, Vibrio alginolyticus Moreover, subsequent metabolomic analyses indicated that K30 succinylation on LuxS may suppress the activated methyl cycle (AMC) and that both the K23 and K30 sites are involved in amino acid metabolism. Taken together, the results from this study provide significant insights into the functions of lysine succinylation and its critical roles on LuxS in regulating the cellular physiology of A. hydrophila.

LasB and CbpD Virulence Factors of Pseudomonas aeruginosa Carry Multiple Post-Translational Modifications on Their Lysine Residues

Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a multi-drug resistant human pathogen largely involved in nosocomial infections. Today, effective antibacterial agents are lacking. Exploring the bacterial physiology at the post-translational modifications (PTM) level may contribute to the renewal of fighting strategies. Indeed, some correlations between PTMs and the bacterial virulence, adaptation, and resistance have been shown. In a previous study performed in P. aeruginosa, we reported that many virulence factors like chitin-binding protein CbpD and elastase LasB were multiphosphorylated. Besides phosphorylation, other PTMs, like those occurring on lysine, seem to play key roles in bacteria. In the present study, we investigated for the first time the lysine succinylome and acetylome of the extracellular compartment of P. aeruginosa by using a two-dimensional immunoaffinity approach. Some virulence factors were identified as multimodified on lysine residues, among them, LasB and CbpD. Lysine can be modified by a wide range of chemical groups. In order to check the presence of other chemical groups on modified lysines identified on LasB and CbpD, we used 1- and 2- dimensional gel electrophoresis approaches to target lysine modified by 7 other modifications: butyrylation, crotonylation, dimethylation, malonylation, methylation, propionylation, and trimethylation. We showed that some lysines of these two virulence factors were modified by these 9 different PTMs. Interestingly, we found that the PTMs recovered on these two virulence factors were different than those previously reported in the intracellular compartment.

Large-Scale Assessment of Bioinformatics Tools for Lysine Succinylation Sites

Lysine succinylation is a form of posttranslational modification of the proteins that play an essential functional role in every aspect of cell metabolism in both prokaryotes and eukaryotes. Aside from experimental identification of succinylation sites, there has been an intense effort geared towards the development of sequence-based prediction through machine learning, due to its promising and essential properties of being highly accurate, robust and cost-effective. In spite of these advantages, there are several problems that are in need of attention in the design and development of succinylation site predictors. Notwithstanding of many studies on the employment of machine learning approaches, few articles have examined this bioinformatics field in a systematic manner. Thus, we review the advancements regarding the current state-of-the-art prediction models, datasets, and online resources and illustrate the challenges and limitations to present a useful guideline for developing powerful succinylation site prediction tools.

Dynamic changes in lysine acetylation and succinylation of the elongation factor Tu in Bacillus subtilis

N^ε-lysine acetylation and succinylation are ubiquitous post-translational modifications in eukaryotes and bacteria. In the present study, we showed a dynamic change in acetylation and succinylation of TufA, the translation elongation factor Tu, from Bacillus subtilis. Increased acetylation of TufA was observed during the exponential growth phase in LB and minimal glucose conditions, and its acetylation level decreased upon entering the stationary phase, while its succinylation increased during the late stationary phase. TufA was also succinylated during vegetative growth under minimal citrate or succinate conditions. Mutational analysis showed that triple succinylation mimic mutations at Lys306, Lys308 and Lys316 in domain-3 of TufA had a negative effect on B. subtilis growth, whereas the non-acylation mimic mutations at these three lysine residues did not. Consistent with the growth phenotypes, the triple succinylation mimic mutant showed 67 % decreased translation activity in vitro, suggesting a possibility that succinylation at the lysine residues in domain-3 decreases the translation activity. TufA, including Lys308, was non-enzymatically succinylated by physiological concentrations of succinyl-CoA. Lys42 in the G-domain was identified as the most frequently modified acetylation site, though its acetylation was likely dispensable for TufA translation activity and growth. Determination of the intracellular levels of acetylating substrates and TufA acetylation revealed that acetyl phosphate was responsible for acetylation at several lysine sites of TufA, but not for Lys42 acetylation. It was speculated that acetyl-CoA was likely responsible for Lys42 acetylation, though AcuA acetyltransferase was not involved. Zn²⁺-dependent AcuC and NAD⁺-dependent SrtN deacetylases were responsible for deacetylation of TufA, including Lys42. These findings suggest the potential regulatory roles of acetylation and succinylation in controlling TufA function and translation in response to nutrient environments in B. subtilis.

Post-translational modification of nucleoid-associated proteins: an extra layer of functional modulation in bacteria?

Post-translational modification (PTM) of histones has been investigated in eukaryotes for years, revealing its widespread occurrence and functional importance. Many PTMs affect chromatin folding and gene activity. Only recently the occurrence of such modifications has been recognized in bacteria. However, it is unclear whether PTM of the bacterial counterparts of eukaryotic histones, nucleoid-associated proteins (NAPs), bears a comparable significance. Here, we scrutinize proteome mass spectrometry data for PTMs of the four most abundantly present NAPs in Escherichia coli (H-NS, HU, IHF and FIS). This approach allowed us to identify a total of 101 unique PTMs in the 11 independent proteomic studies covered in this review. Combined with structural and genetic information on these proteins, we describe potential effects of these modifications (perturbed DNA-binding, structural integrity or interaction with other proteins) on their function.

Effects of PSII Manganese-Stabilizing Protein Succinylation on Photosynthesis in the Model Cyanobacterium Synechococcus sp. PCC 7002

Lysine succinylation is a newly identified protein post-translational modification and plays important roles in various biological pathways in both prokaryotes and eukaryotes, but its extent and function in photosynthetic organisms remain largely unknown. Here, we performed the first systematic studies of lysine succinylation in cyanobacteria, which are the only prokaryotes capable of oxygenic photosynthesis and the established model organisms for studying photosynthetic mechanisms. By using mass spectrometry analysis in combination with the enrichment of succinylated peptides from digested cell lysates, we identified 1,704 lysine succinylation sites on 691 proteins in a model cyanobacterium Synechococcus sp. PCC 7002. Bioinformatic analysis revealed that a large proportion of the succinylation sites were present on proteins in photosynthesis and metabolism. Among all identified succinylated proteins involved in photosynthesis, the PSII manganese-stabilizing protein (PsbO) was found to be succinylated on Lys99 and Lys234. Functional studies of PsbO were performed by site-directed mutagenesis, and mutants mimicking either constitutively succinylated (K99E and K234E) or non-succinylated states (K99R and K234R) were constructed. The succinylation-mimicking K234E mutant exhibited a decreased oxygen evolution rate of the PSII center and the efficiency of energy transfer during the photosynthetic reaction. Molecular dynamics simulations suggested a mechanism that may allow succinylation to influence the efficiency of photosynthesis by altering the conformation of PsbO, thereby hindering the interaction between PsbO and the PSII core. Our findings suggest that reversible succinylation may be an important regulatory mechanism during photosynthesis in Synechococcus, as well as in other photosynthetic organisms.

Proteome and acylome analyses of the functional interaction network between the carbazole-degradative plasmid pCAR1 and host Pseudomonas putida KT2440

Understanding the interplay between a plasmid and its host system is a bottleneck towards prediction of the fate of plasmid-harbouring strains in the natural environments. Here, we studied the impact of the conjugative plasmid pCAR1, involved in carbazole degradation, on the proteome of Pseudomonas putida KT2440 using SILAC method. Furthermore, we investigated two acyl lysine modifications (acetylation and succinylation) that respond to the metabolic status of the cell and are implicated in regulation of various cellular processes. The total proteome analysis revealed that the abundance of key proteins involved in metabolism, signal transduction and motility was affected by pCAR1 carriage. In total, we identified 1359 unique acetylation sites on 637 proteins and 567 unique succinylation sites on 259 proteins. Changes in the acylation status of proteins involved in metabolism and translation by pCAR1 carriage were detected. Remarkably, acylation was identified on proteins involved in important plasmid functions, including partitioning and carbazole degradation, and on nucleoid-associated proteins that play a key role in the functional interaction with the chromosome. This study provides a novel insight on the functional consequences of plasmid carriage and improves our understanding of the plasmid-host cross-talk.

Influence of Glucose Availability and CRP Acetylation on the Genome-Wide Transcriptional Response of Escherichia coli: Assessment by an Optimized Factorial Microarray Analysis

Background: While in eukaryotes acetylation/deacetylation regulation exerts multiple pleiotropic effects, in Escherichia coli it seems to be more limited and less known. Hence, we aimed to progress in the characterization of this regulation by dealing with three convergent aspects: the effector enzymes involved, the master regulator CRP, and the dependence on glucose availability.

Methods: The transcriptional response of E. coli BW25113 was analyzed across 14 relevant scenarios. These conditions arise when the wild type and four isogenic mutants (defective in deacetylase CobB, defective in N(ε)-lysine acetyl transferase PatZ, Q- and R-type mutants of protein CRP) are studied under three levels of glucose availability (glucose-limited chemostat and glucose-excess or glucose-exhausted in batch culture). The Q-type emulates a permanent stage of CRP^acetylated, whereas the R-type emulates a permanent stage of CRP^deacetylated. The data were analyzed by an optimized factorial microarray method (Q-GDEMAR).

Results: (a) By analyzing one mutant against the other, we were able to unravel the true genes that participate in the interaction between ΔcobB/ΔpatZ mutations and glucose availability; (b) Increasing stages of glucose limitation appear to be associated with the up-regulation of specific sets of target genes rather than with the loss of genes present when glucose is in excess; (c) Both CRP^deacetylated and CRP^acetylated produce extensive changes in specific subsets of genes, but their number and identity depend on the glucose availability; (d) In other sub-sets of genes, the transcriptional effect of CRP seems to be independent of its acetylation or deacetylation; (e) Some specific ontology functions can be associated with each of the different sets of genes detected herein.

Conclusions: CRP cannot be thought of only as an effector of catabolite repression, because it acts along all the glucose conditions tested (excess, limited, and exhausted), exerting both positive and negative effects through different sets of genes. Acetylation of CRP does not seem to be a binary form of regulation, as there is not a univocal relationship between its activation/inhibitory effect and its acetylation/deacetylation stage. All the combinatorial possibilities are observed. During the exponential growth phase, CRP also exerts a very significant transcriptional effect, mainly on flagellar assembly and chemotaxis (FDR = 7.2 × 10⁻⁴⁴).