ComK

• Description: competence transcription factor (CTF)
  
  

Gene name	comK
Synonyms
Essential	no
Product	competence transcription factor (CTF)
Function	regulation of competence and DNA uptake
Interactions involving this protein in SubtInteract: ComK
Metabolic function and regulation of this protein in SubtiPathways: Nucleotides (regulation), Protein secretion
MW, pI	22 kDa, 7.669
Gene length, protein length	576 bp, 192 aa
Immediate neighbours	yhzC, yhxD
Get the DNA and protein sequences (Barbe et al., 2009)
Genetic context This image was kindly provided by SubtiList

Categories containing this gene/protein

genetic competence, transcription factors and their control

This gene is a member of the following regulons

AbrB regulon, CodY regulon, ComK regulon, DegU regulon, Rok regulon, Spo0A regulon

The gene

Basic information

• Locus tag: BSU10420

Database entries

• DBTBS entry: [1]

• SubtiList entry: [2]

The protein

Basic information/ Evolution

• Catalyzed reaction/ biological activity:

• Protein family:

• Paralogous protein(s):

Extended information on the protein

• Kinetic information:

• Domains:

• Modification:

• Cofactor(s):

• Effectors of protein activity:

• Interactions:
  • MecA-ComK PubMed

• Localization:

Database entries

• Structure:

• UniProt: P40396

• KEGG entry: [3]

• E.C. number:

Expression and regulation

• Operon: comK PubMed

• Sigma factor: SigA PubMed

• Regulation:
  • repressed by casamino acids PubMed
  • repressed by Rok PubMed
  • repressed during growth in the presence of branched chain amino acids (CodY) PubMed
  • repressed during logrithmic growth (AbrB) PubMed
  • induced at the entry to stationary phase (Spo0A-P) PubMed

• Regulatory mechanism:
  • Rok: transcription repression PubMed
  • CodY: transcription repression PubMed
  • AbrB: transcription repression PubMed
  • ComK: transcription activation (autoregulation) PubMed
  • DegU (non-phosphorylated form): transcription activation PubMed
  • Spo0A-P: transcription activation, acts as antagonist of Rok PubMed

• Additional information:
  • degraded by ClpC-ClpP (with MecA as adaptor protein) PubMed

Biological materials

• Mutant:

• Expression vector: for expression, purification in E. coli with N-terminal His-tag, pRSETA available in Gerth lab

• lacZ fusion:

• GFP fusion:

• two-hybrid system:

• Antibody:

Labs working on this gene/protein

Oscar Kuipers, University of Groningen, The Netherlands Homepage

References

Reviews

Daniel Schultz, Peter G Wolynes, Eshel Ben Jacob, José N Onuchic
Deciding fate in adverse times: sporulation and competence in Bacillus subtilis.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A: 2009, 106(50);21027-34
[PubMed:19995980] [WorldCat.org] [DOI] (I p)

Leendert W Hamoen, Gerard Venema, Oscar P Kuipers
Controlling competence in Bacillus subtilis: shared use of regulators.
Microbiology (Reading): 2003, 149(Pt 1);9-17
[PubMed:12576575] [WorldCat.org] [DOI] (P p)

The ComK regulon

Mitsuo Ogura, Hirotake Yamaguchi, Kazuo Kobayashi, Naotake Ogasawara, Yasutaro Fujita, Teruo Tanaka
Whole-genome analysis of genes regulated by the Bacillus subtilis competence transcription factor ComK.
J Bacteriol: 2002, 184(9);2344-51
[PubMed:11948146] [WorldCat.org] [DOI] (P p)

Randy M Berka, Jeanette Hahn, Mark Albano, Irena Draskovic, Marjan Persuh, Xianju Cui, Alan Sloma, William Widner, David Dubnau
Microarray analysis of the Bacillus subtilis K-state: genome-wide expression changes dependent on ComK.
Mol Microbiol: 2002, 43(5);1331-45
[PubMed:11918817] [WorldCat.org] [DOI] (P p)

Original Publications

Additional publications: PubMed