ArticlePLoS pathogens2010
A bistable switch and anatomical site control Vibrio cholerae virulence gene expression in the intestine.
Article in PLoS pathogens, 2010. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 72 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
72 citing papers in PubMed, 113 citations in OpenAlex.
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- Vibrio cholerae: Understanding a persistent pathogen in Sub-Saharan Africa and the East Mediterranean Region.Pathogens and disease · 2025Review
- Unravelling the Roles of Bacterial Nanomachines Bistability in Pathogens' Life Cycle.Microorganisms · 2024Review
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- Dual-Fluorescence Chromosome-Located Labeling System for Accurate In Vivo Single-Cell Gene Expression Analysis in Pseudomonas syringae.Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.) · 2024Article
- Biofilm formation on human immune cells is a multicellular predation strategy of Vibrio cholerae.Cell · 2023Article
- Achieving Single-Molecule Tracking of Subcellular Regulation in Bacteria during Real-Time Environmental Perturbations.Analytical chemistry · 2023Article
- Navigating Environmental Transitions: the Role of Phenotypic Variation in Bacterial Responses.mBio · 2022Review
- Stochastic activation of a family of TetR type transcriptional regulators controls phenotypic heterogeneity inPNAS nexus · 2022Article
- ToxT Regulon Is Nonessential for Vibrio cholerae Colonization in Adult Mice.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2022Article
- Independent Promoter Recognition by TcpP Precedes Cooperative Promoter Activation by TcpP and ToxR.mBio · 2021Article
- Bacteriophage-Bacteria Interactions in the Gut: From Invertebrates to Mammals.Annual review of virology · 2021Review
- Mucolytic bacteria: prevalence in various pathological diseases.World journal of microbiology & biotechnology · 2021Review
12 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
A fundamental, but unanswered question in host-pathogen interactions is the timing, localization and population distribution of virulence gene expression during infection. Here, microarray and in situ single cell expression methods were used to study Vibrio cholerae growth and virulence gene expression during infection of the rabbit ligated ileal loop model of cholera. Genes encoding the toxin-coregulated pilus (TCP) and cholera toxin (CT) were powerfully expressed early in the infectious process in bacteria adjacent to epithelial surfaces. Increased growth was found to co-localize with virulence gene expression. Significant heterogeneity in the expression of tcpA, the repeating subunit of TCP, was observed late in the infectious process. The expression of tcpA, studied in single cells in a homogeneous medium, demonstrated unimodal induction of tcpA after addition of bicarbonate, a chemical inducer of virulence gene expression. Striking bifurcation of the population occurred during entry into stationary phase: one subpopulation continued to express tcpA, whereas the expression declined in the other subpopulation. ctxA, encoding the A subunit of CT, and toxT, encoding the proximal master regulator of virulence gene expression also exhibited the bifurcation phenotype. The bifurcation phenotype was found to be reversible, epigenetic and to persist after removal of bicarbonate, features consistent with bistable switches. The bistable switch requires the positive-feedback circuit controlling ToxT expression and formation of the CRP-cAMP complex during entry into stationary phase. Key features of this bistable switch also were demonstrated in vivo, where striking heterogeneity in tcpA expression was observed in luminal fluid in later stages of the infection. When this fluid was diluted into artificial seawater, bacterial aggregates continued to express tcpA for prolonged periods of time. The bistable control of virulence gene expression points to a mechanism that could generate a subpopulation of V. cholerae that continues to produce TCP and CT in the rice water stools of cholera patients.
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