Summary The DNA replication and transcription machineries share a common DNA template and thus can collide with each other co-directionally or head-on1,2. Replication-transcription collisions can cause replication fork arrest, premature transcription termination, DNA breaks, and recombination intermediates threatening genome integrity1–10. Collisions may also trigger mutations, which are major contributors of genetic disease and evolution5,7,11. However, the nature and mechanisms of collision-induced mutagenesis remain poorly understood. Here we reveal the genetic consequence of replication-transcription collisions in actively dividing bacteria to be two classes of mutations: duplications/deletions and base substitutions in promoters. Both signatures are highly deleterious but are distinct from the well-characterized base substitutions in coding sequence. Duplications/deletions are likely caused by replication stalling events that are triggered by collisions; their distribution patterns are consistent with where the fork first encounters a transcription complex upon entering a transcription unit. Promoter substitutions result mostly from head-on collisions and frequently occur at a nucleotide conserved in promoters recognized by the major sigma factor in bacteria. This substitution is generated via adenine deamination on the template strand in the promoter open complex, as a consequence of head-on replication perturbing transcription initiation. We conclude that replication-transcription collisions induce distinct mutation signatures by antagonizing replication and transcription, not only in coding sequences but also in gene regulatory elements.

Replication-transcription conflicts promote mutagenesis and give rise to evolutionary signatures, with fundamental importance to genome stability ranging from bacteria to metastatic cancer cells. This review focuses on the interplay between replication-transcription conflicts and the evolution of gene directionality. In most bacteria, the majority of genes are encoded on the leading strand of replication such that their transcription is co-directional with the direction of DNA replication fork movement. This gene strand bias arises primarily due to negative selection against deleterious consequences of head-on replication-transcription conflict. However, many genes remain head-on. Can head-on orientation provide some benefit? We combine insights from both mechanistic and evolutionary studies, review published work, and analyze gene expression data to evaluate an emerging model that head-on genes are temporal targets for adaptive mutagenesis during stress. We highlight the alternative explanation that genes in the head-on orientation may simply be the result of genomic inversions and relaxed selection acting on nonessential genes. We seek to clarify how the mechanisms of replication-transcription conflict, in concert with other mutagenic mechanisms, balanced by natural selection, have shaped bacterial genome evolution.

In the enterobacterial species Escherichia coli and Salmonella enterica, expression of horizontally acquired genes with a higher than average AT content is repressed by the nucleoid-associated protein H-NS. A classical example of an H-NS–repressed locus is the bgl (aryl-β,D-glucoside) operon of E. coli. This locus is “cryptic,” as no laboratory growth conditions are known to relieve repression of bgl by H-NS in E. coli K12. However, repression can be relieved by spontaneous mutations. Here, we investigated the phylogeny of the bgl operon. Typing of bgl in a representative collection of E. coli demonstrated that it evolved clonally and that it is present in strains of the phylogenetic groups A, B1, and B2, while it is presumably replaced by a cluster of ORFans in the phylogenetic group D. Interestingly, the bgl operon is mutated in 20% of the strains of phylogenetic groups A and B1, suggesting erosion of bgl in these groups. However, bgl is functional in almost all B2 isolates and, in approximately 50% of them, it is weakly expressed at laboratory growth conditions. Homologs of bgl genes exist in Klebsiella, Enterobacter, and Erwinia species and also in low GC-content Gram-positive bacteria, while absent in E. albertii and Salmonella sp. This suggests horizontal transfer of bgl genes to an ancestral Enterobacterium. Conservation and weak expression of bgl in isolates of phylogenetic group B2 may indicate a functional role of bgl in extraintestinal pathogenic E. coli.

Escherichia coli strains, in general, do not ferment cellobiose and aryl-␤-D-glucosidic sugars, although "cryptic" ␤-D-glucoside systems have been characterized. Here we describe an additional cryptic operon (bgc) for the utilization of cellobiose and the aryl-␤-D-glucosides arbutin and salicin at low temperature. The bgc operon was identified by the characterization of ␤-glucoside-positive mutants of an E. coli septicemia strain (i484) in which the well-studied bgl (aryl-␤-D-glucoside) operon was deleted. These bgc* mutants appeared after 5 days of incubation on salicin indicator plates at 28°C. The bgc operon codes for proteins homologous to ␤-glucoside/cellobiose-specific phosphoenolpyruvate-dependent phosphotransfer system permease subunits IIB (BgcE), IIC (BgcF), and IIA (BgcI); a porin (BgcH); and a phospho-␤-D-glucosidase (BgcA). Next to the bgc operon maps the divergent bgcR gene, which encodes a GntR-type transcriptional regulator. Expression of the bgc operon is dependent on the cyclic-AMP-dependent regulator protein CRP and positively controlled by BgcR. In the bgc* mutants, a single nucleotide exchange enhances the activity of the bgc promoter, rendering it BgcR independent. Typing of a representative collection of E. coli demonstrated the prevalence of bgc in strains of phylogenetic group B2, representing mainly extraintestinal pathogens, while it is rare among commensal E. coli strains. The bgc locus is also present in the closely related species Escherichia albertii. Further, bioinformatic analyses demonstrated that homologs of the bgc genes exist in the enterobacterial Klebsiella, Enterobacter, and Citrobacter spp. and also in gram-positive bacteria, indicative of horizontal gene transfer events.Members of the family Enterobacteriaceae differ in the ability to utilize cellobiose and other ␤-glucosides (17, 33). Phytopathogenic enterobacteria such as Erwinia species ferment ␤-glucosidic sugars (2, 3, 11). Likewise Klebsiella, Aerobacter, Citrobacter, Hafnia, and Serratia species can utilize ␤-glucosides (28, 33). In contrast, Escherichia coli and Salmonella species do not ferment ␤-glucosides. However, ␤-glucoside-positive spontaneous mutants of most E. coli strains which ferment salicin and arbutin can be isolated (26,32), while this is not the case for Salmonella sp. (33).In E. coli, several loci for the utilization of ␤-glucosides have been characterized. These include the "cryptic" bgl, asc, and arbT loci, as well as the constitutively expressed bglA gene. Among these, the bgl operon is the best characterized (29, 36). The bgl operon is repressed by the nucleoid-associated protein H-NS (10,19,24,34). In the laboratory strain K-12, silencing of bgl by H-NS can be relieved by various mutations, which arise quickly on indicator plates. Consequently, expression of bgl becomes inducible by substrate (20,24). The bgl operon is present in the majority of E. coli strains and functional in most of them. Interestingly, silencing of the bgl operon is less strict in uropathogenic E. coli and related strai...