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. 1967 Dec;94(6):2001–2011. doi: 10.1128/jb.94.6.2001-2011.1967

Transient Repression of the lac Operon

Bonnie Tyler a, William F Loomis Jr a,1, Boris Magasanik a
PMCID: PMC276933  PMID: 4864411

Abstract

Severe transient repression of constitutive or induced β-galactosidase synthesis occurs upon the addition of glucose to cells of Escherichia coli growing on glycerol, succinic acid, or lactic acid. Only mutants particularily well adapted to growth on glucose exhibit this phenomenon when transferred to a glucose-containing medium. No change in ribonucleic acid (RNA) metabolism was observed during transient repression. We could show that transient repression is pleiotropic, affecting all products of the lac operon. It occurs in a mutant insensitive to catabolite repression. It is established much more rapidly than catabolite repression, and is elicited by glucose analogues that are phosphorylated but not further catabolized by the cell. Thus, transient repression is not a consequence of the exclusion of inducer from the cell, does not require catabolism of the added compound, and does not involve a gross change in RNA metabolism. We conclude that transient repression is distinct from catabolite repression.

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2009

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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