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PEDS Advance Access first published online on January 5, 2008
This version published online on January 19, 2008
Protein Engineering Design and Selection, doi:10.1093/protein/gzm085
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© The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Short Communication

Engineering Escherichia coli heat-resistance by synthetic gene amplification

Daniel Christ1,2,3 and Jason W. Chin1,3

1MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Hills Road, Cambridge CB2 2QH, UK 2Present address: Garvan Institute of Medical Research, Victoria Road, Darlinghurst, Sydney NSW 2010, Australia

3 To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: d.christ{at}garvan.org.au (D.C.); E-mail: chin{at}mrc-lmb.cam.ac.uk (J.W.C.)

Organisms have evolved to exploit new environments by processes that involve both mutations and gene amplifications. Though in some cases amplified genes mutate to perform a different molecular function, in other cases altering gene copy number alone is sufficient to change organism function. Here we selected a library of genes, provided at high copy number, for their ability to confer survival on Escherichia coli cells at un-physiologically high temperatures. We find that a single gene (evgA), encoding a master transcriptional regulator, is overwhelmingly selected and allows survival upon heating to temperatures in excess of 50°C. While the detailed mechanisms of this resistance remained unclear, our results demonstrate the potential of copy number manipulation for the engineering of organisms

Keywords: copy number variation/synthetic biology/heat-resistance

Received August 28, 2007; revised October 22, 2007; accepted November 22, 2007.

Edited by Leo James

The originally published version of this paper was incorrect. The authors and their affiliations were incorrect. Daniel Christ and Jason W. Chin are the corresponding authors of this article. Leo James is not an author of this article. The correct details are as follows:

Daniel Christ 1,2,3 and Jason W. Chin 1,3

1 MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Hills Road, Cambridge CB2 2QH, UK and 2 Present Address: Garvan Institute of Medical Research, Victoria Road, Darlinghurst, Sydney, Australia, NSW 2010, Australia

3 To either of whom correspondence should be addresses.

E-mail: d.christ{at}garvan.org.au, chin{at}mrc-lmb.cam.ac.uk


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