Fission Yeast as a Platform for Antibacterial Drug Screens Targeting Bacterial Cytoskeleton Proteins

Summary

Fission yeast is used here as a heterologous host to express bacterial cytoskeletal proteins such as FtsZ and MreB as translational fusion proteins with GFP to visualize their polymerization. Also, compounds that affect polymerization are identified by imaging using a fluorescence microscope.

Abstract

Bacterial cytoskeletal proteins such as FtsZ and MreB perform essential functions such as cell division and cell shape maintenance. Further, FtsZ and MreB have emerged as important targets for novel antimicrobial discovery. Several assays have been developed to identify compounds targeting nucleotide binding and polymerization of these cytoskeletal proteins, primarily focused on FtsZ. Moreover, many of the assays are either laborious or cost-intensive, and ascertaining whether these proteins are the cellular target of the drug often requires multiple methods. Finally, the toxicity of the drugs to eukaryotic cells also poses a problem. Here, we describe a single-step cell-based assay to discover novel molecules targeting bacterial cytoskeleton and minimize hits that might be potentially toxic to eukaryotic cells. Fission yeast is amenable to high-throughput screens based on microscopy, and a visual screen can easily identify any molecule that alters the polymerization of FtsZ or MreB. Our assay utilizes the standard 96-well plate and relies on the ability of the bacterial cytoskeletal proteins to polymerize in a eukaryotic cell such as the fission yeast. While the protocols described here are for fission yeast and utilize FtsZ from Staphylococcus aureus and MreB from Escherichia coli, they are easily adaptable to other bacterial cytoskeletal proteins that readily assemble into polymers in any eukaryotic expression hosts. The method described here should help facilitate further discovery of novel antimicrobials targeting bacterial cytoskeletal proteins.

Introduction

The widespread resistance to nearly all antibiotics presently employed to combat bacterial infections has created an immediate necessity for novel categories of antibiotics. A 2019 report indicated that antibiotic-resistant infections resulted in the loss of 1.27 million lives, contributing to an overall tally of 4.95 million deaths when considering complications from resistant bacterial infections¹. While still effective in clinical practice, the current arsenal of antibiotics predominantly targets a narrow spectrum of cellular processes, primarily focusing on cell wall, DNA, and protein synthesis. Over the past half-century, fewer than 30 pro....

Protocol

1. Expression of GFP-tagged bacterial cytoskeleton proteins in S. pombe

NOTE: Please see Table 1 for information on all plasmids and strains used here. Please see Table 2 for all media compositions.

1. Perform cloning of E. coli MreB with an N-terminal GFP fusion (GFP-MreB) and S. aureus FtsZ carrying a C-terminal GFP (SaFtsZ-GFP) into the S. pombe expression vector, pREP42 with a medium-strength t.......

Discussion

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a serious global health threat, and there is an urgent need for new antibiotics with novel targets. The bacterial cytoskeleton has emerged as an attractive target for developing new antibiotics, with small molecule inhibitors of the cell division protein FtsZ, such as TXA709, already in Phase-I clinical trials³⁰. Several methods have been developed to identify inhibitors of FtsZ polymerization^7,31. We have.......

Materials

Name	Company	Catalog Number	Comments
96 Well CC2 Optical CVG Sterile, w/Lid. Black	Thermo Scientific™	160376
96-well plate	Corning	CLS3370
A22 Hydrochloride	Sigma	SML0471	Dissolved in DMSO
Adenine	FormediumTM	DOC0229	225 mg/L of media
Concanavalin A	Sigma	C5275-5MG
DMSO	Sigma	317275
Edinburg minimal medium (EMM Agar or EMM Broth)	FormediumTM	PMD0210	See below for composition
EDTA	Sigma	EDS-500G
epMotion® 96 with 2-position slider	Eppendorf	5069000101
Histidine	FormediumTM	DOC0144	225 mg/L of media
Leica DMi8 inverted fluorescence microscope	Leica Microsystems		German company
Leucine	FormediumTM	DOC0157	225 mg/L of media
Lithium acetate	Sigma	517992-100G
PC190723	Merck	344580	Dissolved in DMSO
Polyethylene glycol (PEG)	Sigma	202398
Thiamine	Sigma	T4625	Filter sterilised
Tris-Hydrochloride	MP	194855
Uracil	FormediumTM	DOC0214	225 mg/L of media, Store solution at 36°C
YES (Yeast extract + supplements) Agar	FormediumTM	PCM0410	See below for composition
YES (Yeast extract + supplements) Broth	FormediumTM	PCM0310	See below for composition
Yeast (S. pombe) media
Yeast extract + supplements (YES)
	Composition	g/L
	Yeast extract	5
	Dextrose	30
	Agar	17
	Adenine	0.05
	L-Histidine	0.05
	L-Leucine	0.05
	L-Lysine HCl	0.05
	Uracil	0.05
Edinburg minimal medium (EMM)
	Composition	g/L	concentration
	potassium hydrogen phthallate	3	14.7mM
	Na2HPO4	2.2	15.5 mM
	NH4Cl	5	93.5 mM
	glucose	2% (w/v) or 20 g/L	111 mM
	Salts (stock x 50)	20 mL/L (v/v)
	Vitamins (stock x 1000)	1 mL/L (v/v)
	Minerals (Stock x 10,000)	0.1 mL/L (v/v)
Salts x 50	52.5 g/l MgCl2.6H20 (0.26 M)	52.5	0.26 M
	0.735 mg/l CaCl2.2H20 (4.99 mM)	0.000735	4.99 mM
	50 g/l KCl (0.67 M)	50	0.67 M
	2 g/l Na2SO4 (14.l mM)	2	14.1 mM
Vitamins x 1000	1 g/l pantothenic acid	1	4.20 mM
	10 g/l nicotinic acid	10	81.2 mM
	10 g/l inositol	10	55.5 mM
	10 mg/l biotin	0.01	40.8 µM
Minerals x 10,000	boric acid	5	80.9 mM
	MnSO4	4	23.7 mM
	ZnSO4.7H2O	4	13.9 mM
	FeCl2.6H2O	2	7.40 mM
	molybdic acid	0.4	2.47 mM
	KI	1	6.02 mM
	CuSO4.5H2O	0.4	1.60 mM
	citric acid	10	47.6 mM
Strains/ Plasmids
Strains	Description	Reference
CCD190	Escherichia coli DH10β	Invitrogen
CCDY4	MBY3532; CCDY346/pREP42- GFP-EcMreB	Srinivasan et al., 2007
CCDY340	CCDY346/pREP42- SaFtsZ-GFP	Sharma et al., 2023
CCDY346	MBY192; Schizosaccharomyces pombe [ura4-D18, leu1-32, h-]	Dr. Mithilesh Mishra (DBS, TIFR)
Plasmids
pCCD3	pREP42-GFP-EcMreB	Srinivasan et al., 2007
pCCD713	pREP42-SaFtsZ-GFP	Sharma et al., 2023