ArticleMolecular microbiology2011
Biofilm growth alters regulation of conjugation by a bacterial pheromone.
Article in Molecular microbiology, 2011. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 28 papers.
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Who cites it
28 citing papers in PubMed, 60 citations in OpenAlex.
- Prolonged zinc exposure modulates biofilm metabolic activity and conjugation in Enterococcus faecalis.BMC microbiology · 2026Article
- A Novel Method to Monitor the Evolution of Antimicrobial Resistance inInternational journal of molecular sciences · 2026Article
- Comparative Genomic Analysis and Antimicrobial Resistance Profile ofVeterinary sciences · 2025Article
- Current examining methods and mathematical models of horizontal transfer of antibiotic resistance genes in the environment.Frontiers in microbiology · 2024Review
- Horizontal Gene Transfer of Antibiotic Resistance Genes in Biofilms.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
- Enterococcal biofilm-A nidus for antibiotic resistance transfer?Journal of applied microbiology · 2022Review
- Biofilm through the Looking Glass: A Microbial Food Safety Perspective.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Review
- Article
- A Novel Biofilm Model System to Visualise Conjugal Transfer of Vancomycin Resistance by Environmental Enterococci.Microorganisms · 2021Article
- The ecology of plasmid-coded antibiotic resistance: a basic framework for experimental research and modeling.Computational and structural biotechnology journal · 2021Review
- Article
- Ratiometric quorum sensing governs the trade-off between bacterial vertical and horizontal antibiotic resistance propagation.PLoS biology · 2020Article
- Single-Cell Analysis Reveals that the Enterococcal Sex Pheromone Response Results in Expression of Full-Length Conjugation Operon Transcripts in All Induced Cells.Journal of bacteriology · 2020Article
- Biofilm-associated infection by enterococci.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2019Review
- Lysogenization of Staphylococcus aureus RN450 by phages ϕ11 and ϕ80α leads to the activation of the SigB regulon.Scientific reports · 2018Article
- Mechanistic Features of the Enterococcal pCF10 Sex Pheromone Response and the Biology of Enterococcus faecalis in Its Natural Habitat.Journal of bacteriology · 2018Review
- Stochasticity in the enterococcal sex pheromone response revealed by quantitative analysis of transcription in single cells.PLoS genetics · 2017Article
- Enterococcus faecalis readily colonizes the entire gastrointestinal tract and forms biofilms in a germ-free mouse model.Virulence · 2017Article
- PrgU: a suppressor of sex pheromone toxicity in Enterococcus faecalis.Molecular microbiology · 2017Article
- Interspecies transfer of vancomycin, erythromycin and tetracycline resistance among Enterococcus species recovered from agrarian sources.BMC microbiology · 2017Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Conjugation is an important mode of horizontal gene transfer in bacteria, enhancing the spread of antibiotic resistance. In clinical settings, biofilms are likely locations for antibiotic resistance transfer events involving nosocomial pathogens such as Enterococcus faecalis. Here we demonstrate that growth in biofilms alters the induction of conjugation by a sex pheromone in E. faecalis. Mathematical modelling suggested that a higher plasmid copy number in biofilm cells would enhance a switch-like behaviour in the pheromone response of donor cells with a delayed, but increased response to the mating signal. Alterations in plasmid copy number, and a bimodal response to induction of conjugation in populations of plasmid-containing donor cells were both observed in biofilms, consistent with the predictions of the model. The pheromone system may have evolved such that donor cells in biofilms are only induced to transfer when they are in extremely close proximity to potential recipients in the biofilm community. These results may have important implications for development of chemotherapeutic agents to block resistance transfer and treat biofilm-related clinical infections.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.