Applied and Environmental Microbiology (2006) 72, 6584-6592

Steven J. Dodd, Mark R.H. Hurst, Travis R. Glare, Maureen O'Callaghan and Clive W. Ronson (2006)
Occurrence of sep insecticidal toxin complex genes in Serratia spp. and Yersinia frederiksenii
Applied and Environmental Microbiology 72 (10), 6584-6592
Abstract: Some strains of Serratia entomophila and S. proteamaculans cause amber disease of the grass grub Costelytra zealandica (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae). Three genes required for virulence, sepABC, are located on a large plasmid, pADAP. Sequence analysis suggests that the sepABC gene cluster may be part of a horizontally mobile region. This study presents evidence for the putative mobility of the sep genes of pADAP. Southern blot analysis showed that orthologues of the sep genes reside on plasmids within S. entomophila, S. liquefaciens, S. proteamaculans, and a plasmid from Yersinia frederiksenii. Three plasmids hybridized to the pADAP sep virulence-associated region but not the pADAP replication and conjugation regions. Subsequent DNA sequence analysis of the Y. frederiksenii sep-like genes, designated tcYF1 and tcYF2, showed that they had 88% and 87% DNA identity to sepA and sepB, respectively. These results indicate that the sep genes are part of a discrete horizontally mobile region.
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Link to article at publishers website
Database assignments for author(s): Travis R. Glare, Maureen O'Callaghan

Research topic(s) for pests/diseases/weeds:
biocontrol - natural enemies
Research topic(s) for beneficials or antagonists:
molecular biology - genes

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Pest and/or beneficial records:

Beneficial	Pest/Disease/Weed	Crop/Product	Country	Quarant.
	Costelytra giveni
Serratia entomophila (entomopathogen)	Costelytra giveni
Serratia proteamaculans (entomopathogen)	Costelytra giveni