ArticlemBio2015
A Phase-Variable Surface Layer from the Gut Symbiont Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron.
Article in mBio, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 22 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
22 citing papers in PubMed, 29 citations in OpenAlex.
- Growth capacity and mortality burden shape microbial persistence under osmotic stress inbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- TPMM: three-component posterior mixture model enables robust inverton detection in low-depth metagenomes and suggests potential viral invertons.Bioinformatics (Oxford, England) · 2026Article
- A family of RRM-1 RNA binding proteins enables cold adaptation and environmental resilience inbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- A phase-variable capsule facilitatesmBio · 2026Article
- Assembly, architecture and functional roles of microbial surface layers.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2026Review
- Dual membrane-spanning anti-sigma 2 controls OMV biogenesis and colonization fitness inJournal of bacteriology · 2026Article
- Adaptations in gut Bacteroidales facilitate stable co-existence with their lytic bacteriophages.Gut microbes · 2025Article
- Structure of a distinct β-barrel assembly machinery complex in the Bacteroidota.Nature microbiology · 2025Article
- Transcriptional regulatory networks of the human gut symbiont Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron are uncovered using machine learning.Nucleic acids research · 2025Article
- Carbohydrates and the oxidative branch of the pentose phosphate pathway modifyJournal of bacteriology · 2025Article
- A porin-like protein used by bacterial predators defines a wider lipid-trapping superfamily.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Role of phase-variable Mfa1 fimbriae ofGut microbes reports · 2025Article
- Deep learning revealed the distribution and evolution patterns for invertible promoters across bacterial lineages.Nucleic acids research · 2024Article
- Key roles of two-component systems in intestinal signal sensing and virulence regulation in enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli.FEMS microbiology reviews · 2024Review
- Article
- Systems and synthetic biology-driven engineering of live bacterial therapeutics.Frontiers in bioengineering and biotechnology · 2023Review
- Analysis of a phase-variable restriction modification system of the human gut symbiont Bacteroides fragilis.Nucleic acids research · 2020Article
- Phase-variable capsular polysaccharides and lipoproteins modify bacteriophage susceptibility in Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron.Nature microbiology · 2020Article
- Inflammatory Bowel Diseases: Host-Microbial-Environmental Interactions in Dysbiosis.Diseases (Basel, Switzerland) · 2020Review
- Invertible promoters mediate bacterial phase variation, antibiotic resistance, and host adaptation in the gut.Science (New York, N.Y.) · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
unlabelledThe capsule from Bacteroides, a common gut symbiont, has long been a model system for studying the molecular mechanisms of host-symbiont interactions. The Bacteroides capsule is thought to consist of an array of phase-variable polysaccharides that give rise to subpopulations with distinct cell surface structures. Here, we report the serendipitous discovery of a previously unknown surface structure in Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron: a surface layer composed of a protein of unknown function, BT1927. BT1927, which is expressed in a phase-variable manner by ~1:1,000 cells in a wild-type culture, forms a hexagonally tessellated surface layer. The BT1927-expressing subpopulation is profoundly resistant to complement-mediated killing, due in part to the BT1927-mediated blockade of C3b deposition. Our results show that the Bacteroides surface structure is capable of a far greater degree of structural variation than previously known, and they suggest that structural variation within a Bacteroides species is important for productive gut colonization. IMPORTANCE: Many bacterial species elaborate a capsule, a structure that resides outside the cell wall and mediates microbe-microbe and microbe-host interactions. Species of Bacteroides, the most abundant genus in the human gut, produce a capsule that consists of an array of polysaccharides, some of which are known to mediate interactions with the host immune system. Here, we report the discovery of a previously unknown surface structure in Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron. We show that this protein-based structure is expressed by a subset of cells in a population and protects Bacteroides from killing by complement, a component of the innate immune system. This novel surface layer protein is conserved across many species of the genus Bacteroides, suggesting an important role in colonization and host immune modulation.
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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.