Article
Nature 390, 580-586 (11 December 1997) | doi:10.1038/37551; Received 3 November 1997; Accepted 18 November 1997
Genomic sequence of a Lyme disease spirochaete, Borrelia burgdorferi
Claire M. Fraser1, Sherwood Casjens2, Wai Mun Huang2, Granger G. Sutton1, Rebecca Clayton1, Raju Lathigra3, Owen White1, Karen A. Ketchum1, Robert Dodson1, Erin K. Hickey1, Michelle Gwinn1, Brian Dougherty1, Jean-Francois Tomb1, Robert D. Fleischmann1, Delwood Richardson1, Jeremy Peterson1, Anthony R. Kerlavage1, John Quackenbush1, Steven Salzberg1, Mark Hanson3, Rene van Vugt2, Nanette Palmer2, Mark D. Adams1, Jeannine Gocayne1, Janice Weidman1, Teresa Utterback1, Larry Watthey1, Lisa McDonald1, Patricia Artiach1, Cheryl Bowman1, Stacey Garland1, Claire Fujii1, Matthew D. Cotton1, Kurt Horst1, Kevin Roberts1, Bonnie Hatch1, Hamilton O. Smith1 and J. Craig Venter1
- The Institute for Genomic Research, 9712 Medical Center Drive, Rockville, Maryland 20850, USA
- Division of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Department of Oncological Sciences, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah 84132, USA
- MedImmune, Inc., 35 West Watkins Mill Road, Gaithersburg, Maryland 20878, USA
Correspondence to: Claire M. Fraser1 Correspondence and requests for materials should be sent to C.M.F. (e-mail: Email: gbb@tigr.org).The annoted genomes equence and gene family alignments are available on the World-Wide Web at http://www.tigr.org/tdb/mdb/bbdb/bbdb.html. Sequences have been deposited with GenBank under the following accession numbers: AE00783 (chromosome); AE00784 (lp28-3); AE000785 (lp25); AE00786 (lp28-2); AE00787 (lp38); AE00788 (lp36); AE00789 (lp28-4); AE00790 (lp54); AE00791 (cp9); AE00792 (cp26); AE00793 (lp17); and AE00794 (lp28-1).
Abstract
The genome of the bacterium Borrelia burgdorferi B31, the aetiologic agent of Lyme disease, contains a linear chromosome of 910,725 base pairs and at least 17 linear and circular plasmids with a combined size of more than 533,000 base pairs. The chromosome contains 853 genes encoding a basic set of proteins for DNA replication, transcription, translation, solute transport and energy metabolism, but, like Mycoplasma genitalium, it contains no genes for cellular biosynthetic reactions. Because B. burgdorferi and M. genitalium are distantly related eubacteria, we suggest that their limited metabolic capacities reflect convergent evolution by gene loss from more metabolically competent progenitors. Of 430 genes on 11 plasmids, most have no known biological function; 39% of plasmid genes are paralogues that form 47 gene families. The biological significance of the multiple plasmid-encoded genes is not clear, although they may be involved in antigenic variation or immune evasion.