Our results revealed that, as was previously shown for the cka gene [19], only a small portion of the population expressed the investigated activity genes (colicin A, caa, Figure 1, Figure 2 and Table 3). We showed that single cell expression of these genes correlates with the predicted affinity of binding of the LexA Talazoparib mw protein to the operator sequences (Table 3), as expressed by

the heterology index (HI). The HI was defined to determine the degree of divergence of any 20 nucleotide sequences from the consensus LexA-binding site [23]. Sequences with a low HI are closer to the consensus and are predicted to bind LexA with greater affinity than sites with a higher HI. Thus, the colicin E7 SOS boxes, which have the highest HI values and therefore the lowest predicted affinity of LexA binding, exhibit approximately three fold higher percentage of cells expressing the colicin activity gene compared to the pore forming VS-4718 nmr colicins examined in this study. On the other

hand, single cell analysis of cells harboring a gfp fusion with the colicin M activity gene promoter, cma-gfp, revealed low level expression in the large majority of the investigated cells. Colicin M was shown to be tightly connected with the upstream colicin B encoding genes and it is presumed that expression of both colicins B and M is regulated from common SOS boxes situated upstream of the colicin B activity gene [16, 18]. Colicins M and B are among the most abundant colicins produced by E. coli strains [24]. We analysed Selleck AUY-922 the nucleotide Phosphoglycerate kinase sequences upstream of cma and found neither colicin regulatory motifs nor any consensus promoter sequence (data not presented). Nonetheless, we detected uniform low-level fluorescence mediated by the colicin M promoter (Figure 2, Table 3). Figure 1 Merged image of the phase contrast and fluorescence images of RW118 with a caa-gfp transcriptional fusion. Only a small subpopulation of cells exhibited high fluorescence intensity, while the large majority of the

cells exhibited no fluorescence. Figure 2 Quantification of fluorescence intensity among strains expressing gfp transcriptional fusions. Number of cells from digital micrographs were calculated and to each cell the relative fluorescence was assigned with the use of Scion Image software. The average fluorescence value and number of cells within a narrow interval was plotted. A: Expression of gfp transcriptional fusions in RW118 and B: Expression in isogenic recA defective RW464. Table 3 Cells expressing SOS regulated genes in the wild type RW118 gfp transcriptional fusion % of intensely fluorescent cells Fluorescence threshold level* Cell count HI Distal Proximal† caa-gfp (pSC300) 0.62 41 15555 11.52 9.73 cna-gfp (pSC301) 0.51 41 9793 7.55 11.61 ce1a-gfp (pSC302) 0.48 41 12197 7.48 11.06 ce7a-gfp (pSC303) 1.55 41 9338 12.44 12.