The mevalonate auxotrophic mutant of Staphylococcus aureus can adapt to mevalonate depletion.

In this study, we attempted to adopt the auxotrophic mevalonate synthase mutant (ΔmvaS mutant) of Staphylococcus aureus to study whether a nongrowing but viable cell population is tolerant to bactericidal antibiotics. The mevalonate-depleted nongrowing ΔmvaS mutant was found tolerant to antibiotics. Surprisingly, after prolonged cultivation, we obtained stable ΔmvaS variants that were able to grow without mevalonate, which suggested unknown mechanisms for compensating undecaprenyl pyrophosphate production without mevalonate in S. aureus.