Growth rate regulation of 4.5 S RNA and M1 RNA the catalytic subunit of Escherichia coli RNase P

Abstract

We have studied the expression of 4.5 S RNA and M1 RNA, the catalytic subunit of Escherchia coli RNase P, under various growth conditions. Both RNA species increase in abundance as a function of growth rate. There are roughly 450 molecules of 4.5 S RNA and 80 molecules of M1 RNA per cell at 0.4 doubling per hour, and this is increased to 5300 and 1060 molecules per cell, respectively, at 2.7 doublings per hour. Deletion of both relA and spoT, the two genes that are responsible for synthesis of ppGpp, does not affect the rate of synthesis of either RNA species. However, deletion of fis renders the expression of 4.5 S RNA independent of growth rate, but has little effect on the expression of M1 RNA. These data suggest that the expression of both 4.5 S RNA and M1 RNA genes are growth-rate regulated, but not through the same mechanism. The growth-rate dependent accumulation of 4.5 S RNA depends on FIS-mediated trans-activation, whereas that of M1 RNA is not governed by ppGpp or by FIS.