Abstract
Bacterial genomes are highly plastic and evolve rapidly by acquiring new genetic information through horizontal gene transfer mechanisms. Capturing DNA transfer by conjugation between bacterial cells in real time is relevant to address bacterial genomes’ dynamic architecture comprehensively. Here, we describe a method allowing the direct visualization of bacterial conjugation in live cells, including the fluorescent labeling of the conjugative pilus and the monitoring of plasmid DNA transfer from donor to recipient cells.
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Acknowledgments
The authors thank the National BioResource Project (NBRP). This work was supported by the Schlumberger Foundation for Education and Research (FSER 2019), and the French National Research Agency (grant number ANR-18-CE35-0008, PlasMed) provided funding to K.G. The authors declared no competing interests.
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Goldlust, K., Couturier, A., Terradot, L., Lesterlin, C. (2022). Live-Cell Visualization of DNA Transfer and Pilus Dynamics During Bacterial Conjugation. In: Leake, M.C. (eds) Chromosome Architecture. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol 2476. Humana, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-0716-2221-6_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-0716-2221-6_6
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