Posttranslational Control of PlsB Is Sufficient To Coordinate Membrane Synthesis with Growth in Escherichia coli

Abstract

How do bacterial cells grow without breaking their membranes? Although the biochemistry of fatty acid and membrane synthesis is well known, how membrane synthesis is balanced with growth and metabolism has remained unclear. This is partly due to the many control points that have been discovered within the membrane synthesis pathways. By precisely establishing the contributions of individual pathway enzymes, our results simplify the model of membrane biogenesis in the model bacterial species Escherichia coli . Specifically, we found that allosteric control of a single enzyme, PlsB, is sufficient to balance growth with membrane synthesis and to ensure that growing E. coli cells produce sufficient membrane. Identifying the signals that activate and deactivate PlsB will resolve the issue of how membrane synthesis is synchronized with growth.