Part:BBa_K1790003

GBS

Geobacillus stearothermophilus (formally Bacillus stearothermophilus) is a rod-shaped, Gram-positive bacterium and a member of the division Firmicutes. The bacteria is a thermophile and is widely distributed in soil, hot springs, ocean sediment, and is a cause of spoilage in food products. It will grow within a temperature range of 30-75 degrees Celsius. Some strains are capable of oxidizing carbon monoxide aerobically. It is commonly used as a challenge organism for sterilization validation studies and periodic check of sterilization cycles. Recently, a DNA polymerase derived from these bacteria, Bst polymerase, has become important in molecular biology applications.

HAD

YniC is a sugar phosphatase belonging to the superfamily of haloacid dehalogenase (HAD)-like hydrolases. Its preferred substrate is 2-deoxyglucose-6-phosphate [Kuznetsova06]. The phosphatase activity of YniC was first discovered in a high-throughput screen of purified proteins [Kuznetsova05]. Phosphatase activity of YniC is dependent on the presence of a divalent cation such as Mg2+, which appears to affect substrate binding [Kuznetsova06]. Mutagenesis of the predicted catalytic Asp residues in YniC results in loss of phosphatase activity. A yniC deletion mutant is more sensitive to the presence of 2-deoxyglucose in the growth medium than wild type, while a strain overexpressing yniC tolerates higher concentrations of 2-deoxyglucose [Kuznetsova06]. 2-deoxyglucose is taken up by E. coli and is phosphorylated to 2-deoxyglucose-6P, a toxic analog of glucose-6P [Dietz71].