Figure 4. Phenotypic characterization of L. lactis strains carrying knock-out deletions in genes from the CesSR regulon.

A. Growth rates in GM17 of the indicated deletion strains carrying pNZbcaP-H6 (producing BcaP-H6; full bars) or carrying pNZbcaP-GFP-H6 (producing BcaP-GFP-H6; striped bars) when uninduced (black or black and white stripes) or induced with 5 ng/ml nisin A (gray or gray and white stripes) at OD₆₀₀ = 0.5. The horizontal lines represent growth of the empty vector control strain L. lactis NZ9000 (pNZ8048) (uninduced – dark line; induced – gray line). B. Distribution, as measured by flow-cytometry, of BcaP-GFP-H6 content per cell 1 hour after induction of the protein from pNZbcaP-GFP-H6 carried by the indicated knock-out mutants.