No abstract

The Viable But Non Culturable (VBNC) state has been thoroughly studied in bacteria. In contrast, it has received much less attention in other microorganisms. However, it has been suggested that various yeast species occurring in wine may enter in VBNC following sulfite stress.In order to provide conclusive evidences for the existence of a VBNC state in yeast, the ability of Saccharomyces cerevisiae to enter into a VBNC state by applying sulfite stress was investigated. Viable populations were monitored by flow cytometry while culturable populations were followed by plating on culture medium. Twenty-four hours after the application of the stress, the comparison between the culturable population and the viable population demonstrated the presence of viable cells that were non culturable. In addition, removal of the stress by increasing the pH of the medium at different time intervals into the VBNC state allowed the VBNC S. cerevisiae cells to “resuscitate”. The similarity between the cell cycle profiles of VBNC cells and cells exiting the VBNC state together with the generation rate of cells exiting VBNC state demonstrated the absence of cellular multiplication during the exit from the VBNC state. This provides evidence of a true VBNC state. To get further insight into the molecular mechanism pertaining to the VBNC state, we studied the involvement of the SSU1 gene, encoding a sulfite pump in S. cerevisiae. The physiological behavior of wild-type S. cerevisiae was compared to those of a recombinant strain overexpressing SSU1 and null Δssu1 mutant. Our results demonstrated that the SSU1 gene is only implicated in the first stages of sulfite resistance but not per se in the VBNC phenotype. Our study clearly demonstrated the existence of an SO2-induced VBNC state in S. cerevisiae and that the stress removal allows the “resuscitation” of VBNC cells during the VBNC state.

The role of ribosome biogenesis in erythroid development is supported by the recognition of erythroid defects in ribosomopathies in both Diamond-Blackfan anemia and 5q- syndrome. Whether ribosome biogenesis exerts a regulatory function on normal erythroid development is still unknown. In the present study, a detailed characterization of ribosome biogenesis dynamics during human and murine erythropoiesis shows that ribosome biogenesis is abruptly interrupted by the drop of rDNA transcription and the collapse of ribosomal protein neo-synthesis. Its premature arrest by RNA polI inhibitor, CX-5461 targets the proliferation of immature erythroblasts. We also show that p53 is activated spontaneously or in response to CX-5461 concomitantly to ribosome biogenesis arrest, and drives a transcriptional program in which genes involved in cell cycle arrest, negative regulation of apoptosis and DNA damage response were upregulated. RNA polI transcriptional stress results in nucleolar disruption and activation of ATR-CHK1-p53 pathway. Our results imply that the timing of ribosome biogenesis extinction and p53 activation are crucial for erythroid development. In ribosomopathies in which ribosome availability is altered by unbalanced production of ribosomal proteins, the threshold of ribosome biogenesis down-regulation could be prematurely reached and together with pathological p53 activation prevents a normal expansion of erythroid progenitors.