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. 1978 Oct;22(1):10–17. doi: 10.1128/iai.22.1.10-17.1978

Plasmid Carriage and the Serum Sensitivity of Enterobacteria

Peter W Taylor 1, Colin Hughes 1
PMCID: PMC422108  PMID: 365738

Abstract

The carriage of a range of plasmids by rough, serum-sensitive laboratory strains of Escherichia coli made no difference to their reactivity in human serum as determined by two methods. Plasmid-carrying enterobacteria isolated from polluted river water gave a variety of responses to serum. Smooth E. coli river isolate C8 was killed by serum but only after a delay of 1 h, and curing of antibiotic resistance and colicin determinants from this strain led to a small but significant increase in serum sensitivity. Plasmids from eight strains were transferred by conjugation to a cured derivative of C8 (C8−NalR), and in six cases a significant increase in the serum resistance of the progeny was observed. Plasmid-mediated enhancement of resistance was particularly marked with plasmids R1 and NR1, and a round of replication mutant of NR1 conferred greater resistance than did the normal R factor. However, R1 and NR1 were unable to modify the serum response of a cured strain (P21−NalR) derived from promptly serum-sensitive isolate P21. These findings suggest that lipopolysaccharide O-side chains, the cell surface components responsible for the delay in serum killing, are essential for the expression of plasmid factors that modify sensitivity to serum. Examination of K(A)− variants of two isolates indicated that the K(A) antigen has only a marginal effect on the serum response.

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Selected References

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

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