@article{mbs:/content/journal/micro/10.1099/mic.0.062448-0, author = "Aznar, Sonia and Paytubi, Sonia and Juárez, Antonio", title = "The Hha protein facilitates incorporation of horizontally acquired DNA in enteric bacteria", journal= "Microbiology", year = "2013", volume = "159", number = "Pt_3", pages = "545-554", doi = "https://doi.org/10.1099/mic.0.062448-0", url = "https://www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/journal/micro/10.1099/mic.0.062448-0", publisher = "Microbiology Society", issn = "1465-2080", type = "Journal Article", abstract = "Hha-like proteins are an evolutive trait of members of the family Enterobacteriaceae. These proteins mimic the oligomerization domain of the nucleoid-associated protein H-NS and interact with this latter protein to modulate gene expression. In this report, we provide evidence that, as has been shown for H-NS, Hha-like proteins play an essential role facilitating acquisition of horizontally transferred DNA in both Escherichia coli and Salmonella. Incorporation of conjugative plasmids such as pHly152 or R27 results in a fitness cost in E. coli or Salmonella strains that lack Hha-like proteins. E. coli spontaneous derivatives from double hha ydgT mutants that showed an increased growth rate and a restored fitness overexpressed the H-NS protein. In addition to reinforcing the role of H-NS/Hha-modulating xenogeneic DNA, the results obtained demonstrate that the Enterobacteriaceae display regulatory features not found in other bacteria that facilitate incorporation of horizontally transferred DNA.", }