Instability of sensory histidine kinase mRNAs in Escherichia coli

Abstract

Background: Regulating mRNA stability is one of the essential mechanisms in gene expression. In order to identify genes from Escherichia coli whole genome whose expression is effectively modulated during the process of mRNA decay, we previously performed differential display-PCR as the first step. In the screening, it was suggested that two mRNAs from the histidine kinase genes, narX and yojN, in a two-component signal transduction system, were extremely unstable. In this study we analysed the stability of sensory kinase mRNAs, e.g. arcB, barA, rcsC, narQ, narX and evgS mRNA. Results: The cellular level of the histidine kinase mRNAs was very low and the mRNAs were rapidly degraded in wild-type cells cultured at 37 °C in LB medium. Additional experiments using RNase E deficient cells indicated that the mRNAs existed abundantly and expressed a prolonged half-life in the cells. Monocistronic transcripts of the cognate response regulator genes, arcA, rcsB, narP and narL have a half-life of 1.5-3.4 min. Conclusions: mRNAs of the six histidine kinase genes in E. coli are synthesized efficiently, but rapidly degraded in wild-type cells.