FIGURE 6.

Functional adherence of ECP to plant tissue. A, bacteria recovered from spinach leaves and roots following a 2-h adherence assay for E. coli O157:H7 Sakai WT, mutants ΔecpA and ΔecpA–D, and the complemented ΔecpA–D mutant with plasmid pYR007 or the control pSE380. The average number of bacteria is expressed as log₁₀ cfu/g of fresh tissue. B, bacteria recovered from spinach roots following a 2-h adherence assay with AF, arabinanase (Arase), PL, and PL buffer treatments for E. coli O157:H7 Sakai WT. Significance levels are as follows: ***, p ≤ 0.001; **, p ≤ 0.005; *, p ≤ 0.05; NS, non-significant. Error bars represent S.E.