The activity of the Pseudomonas aeruginosa pilin promoter is enhanced by an upstream regulatory site.

Recently, a comparison of the nucleotide sequences upstream of the structural pilin genes (pil) from five different isolates of Pseudomonas aeruginosa identified a sequence homologous to a NifA-binding site, a positive regulatory sequence in Klebsiella pneumoniae which controls the expression of the genes which fix nitrogen [Pasloske et al., J. Bacteriol. 170 (1988) 3738-3741]. This sequence was located between -98 and -114 bp relative to the transcription start point. To establish whether this putative recognition sequence exerted any regulatory effect on pil gene expression, we assayed for the expression of pilin and pili, and assessed the strength of the pilin promoter with and without this upstream sequence. A 48-bp deletion, which removed the putative recognition sequence, decreased the levels of pilin and pilus expression. Also, the equivalent deletion reduced pilin promoter activity by 90% when it was measured using a promoter probe vector. These results provide evidence that a nucleotide sequence upstream of the pilin promoter positively regulates the transcription of the P. aeruginosa pil gene.