BackgroundThe ability to genetically manipulate bacteria has been fundamentally important for both basic biological discovery and translational research to develop new vaccines and antibiotics. Experimental alteration of the genetic content of prokaryotic pathogens has revealed both expected functional relationships and unexpected phenotypic consequences. Slow growth phenotypes have been reported for multiple transformed bacterial species, including extracellular and intracellular pathogens. Understanding the genes and pathways responsible for the slow growth phenotype provides the opportunity to develop attenuated vaccines as well as bacteriostatic antibiotics. Transformed Anaplasma marginale, a rickettsial pathogen, exhibits slow growth in vitro and in vivo as compared to the parent wild type strain, providing the opportunity to identify the underlying genes and pathways associated with this phenotype.
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