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. 2023 Feb 14;21(2):e3001988. doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001988

Fig 7. RsmQ exerts a conditional effect on plasmid conjugation rate.

Fig 7

(a) Competitive rhizosphere colonisation assay comparing the fitness of plasmid-free SBW25 with SBW25 (-, green), carrying either pQBR103Km (WT, red) or pQBR103Km-ΔrsmQ (ΔrsmQ, blue). Mann–Whitney U tests comparing plasmid-carrying cells to plasmid free with significance indicated (p < 0.001 ***). (b) Relative fitness on solid agar of plasmid-free SBW25 with SBW25 carrying either pQBR103Km (red) or pQBR103Km-ΔrsmQ (blue) on KB, M9 GC, or M9 Pyr. Significant differences were observed between plasmid carriers and plasmid-free strains in KB and M9 GC media (indicated above as follows: p < 0.05*, p < 0.001**, p < 0.0001***, p < 0.00001****) when compared using a one-way ANOVA with Tukey’s multiple comparisons; however, no differences were observed when comparing SBW25 +pQBR103Km ±ΔrsmQ. (c) Conjugation rate for SBW25 carrying either pQBR103Km (red) or pQBR103Km-ΔrsmQ (blue) on KB, M9 GC, or M9 Pyr. Two-way ANOVA analysis with Sidak’s multiple comparisons showed both a significant media (p < 0.0001) and plasmid (p < 0.01) effect and a significant difference between pQBR103Km and pQBR103Km-ΔrsmQ on M9 Pyr (p < 0.01**). All assays were performed with 10 biological and 2 technical replicates. Data containing a conjugation rate count of 0 were excluded from the dataset. Data are available in S6 Data.