Distribution of mercury resistance transposons in natural bacteria populations
Nikiforov, V.G.; Bass, I.A.; Bogdanova, E.S.; Gorlenko AhM; Kaliaeva, E.S.; Kopteva, A.V.; Lomovskaia, O.L.; Minakhin, L.S.; Minakhina, S.V.; Mindlin, S.Z.; Petrova, M.A.; Kholodiĭ, G.I.; Iur'eva, O.V.
Molekuliarnaia Biologiia 33(1): 55-62
1999
ISSN/ISBN: 0026-8984 PMID: 10330661 Document Number: 508409
A brief review of the studies of the diversity of bacterial determinants of mercury resistance (mer) and their distribution in geographically remote natural populations conducted by the Laboratory of molecular genetics of microorganisms is presented. Significant polymorphism of mer-operons and their transposons was observed in a collection of bacterial strains. Data were obtained that demonstrated wide geographic distribution of certain sequence variants and their horizontal transfer between bacteria of different systematic groups. New transposon types participating in the distribution of mer-operons among natural bacteria were found. Many of these transposons have mosaic structure and, apparently, developed as a result of homologous and/or site-specific recombination between individual operons mercury resistance transposons in gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria.