aureus Δsfa parental strain (Figure 1D). Supplementation of growth media with L-Dap bypasses sbnA and sbnB mutations, allowing for restored staphyloferrin B production in S. aureus If SbnA and SbnB are involved in the production of L-Dap for staphyloferrin B biosynthesis, then the growth deficit phenotype displayed by S. aureus Δsfa sbnA::Tc and S. aureus Δsfa sbnB::Tc mutants (Figure 1) should be restored when L-Dap is supplemented in the culture medium, since presence of this molecule would bypass the need for the activities of SbnA or SbnB in siderophore production. Accordingly, as shown in Figure 2A, the iron-restricted growth of sbnA and

sbnB Selleckchem Target Selective Inhibitor Library mutants is restored equivalent to that of staphyloferrin B-producing cells when the culture medium of the sbnA and sbnB mutants is supplemented with L-Dap, but not D-Dap. This is in agreement with the fact that only the L-isomer of Dap is present in the final structure of the staphyloferrin B molecule [15, 16, 28]. Providing L-Dap to the complete staphyloferrin-deficient mutant (Δsfa Δsbn) did not allow iron-restricted growth, suggesting that growth restoration of sbnA and sbnB mutants by L-Dap is a Tipifarnib molecular weight result of this precursor being incorporated into a functional siderophore in the presence of other staphyloferrin B biosynthesis enzymes (Figure 2A).

This result shows that provision of L-Dap to either sbnA or sbnB mutants allowed the bypass of the requirement for these genes in staphyloferrin B biosynthesis, which strongly supports the hypothesis that sbnA and sbnB function together in a direct role in L-Dap synthesis.

Figure 2 Supplementation of culture medium with L-Dap allows S. aureus sbnA and sbnB mutants to overcome the block in synthesis of staphyloferrin B. A) Bacterial growth curves in chelex 100-treated TMS containing 10 μM holo-transferrin as the sole iron Selleckchem 17-AAG source, with the indicated supplements. B) Siderophore Megestrol Acetate quantification from culture supernatants of iron-starved S. aureus mutants via CAS assay (see Materials and Methods). The inset graph represents culture supernatants from identical strains but grown in medium supplemented with FeCl3. Siderophore units are normalized to culture density. C) Same as in B) except culture media was supplemented with L-Dap. D) Siderophore-disk diffusion assays. Culture supernatants to be tested were derived from S. aureus Δsfa sbnA::Tc or Δsfa sbnB::Tc strains cultured in medium supplemented with, or without, L-Dap, as indicated, and were spotted onto sterile paper disks before being placed onto TMS agar plates seeded with S. aureus wild-type and siderophore transport mutants, as indicated. Plate disk bioassay is described in Materials and Methods. E) Bacterial growth curves for cultures of S. aureus Δsfa sbnA::Tc and S.