Abstract
EVERY transmissible bacterial plasmid like a colicin (col) factor or a drug resistance (R) factor necessarily contains a sex factor responsible for its transmission by conjugation1–3. The conjugation bridge is likely to be a sex pilus4 and examination of some eighty independent plasmids of various kinds isolated from Enterobacteriaceae has shown that only two types of sex pili can positively be identified and therefore that only two types of sex factor are probably present2,3. These are typified by F, the well known sex factor of Escherichia coli, and by I, the sex factor of colI (refs. 2 and 3). Phages specific for F-like sex pili have frequently been isolated and are of two kinds: isometric RNA phages attaching along the length of the sex pilus and filamentous DNA phages attaching to the tip of the pilus5. The morphological and antigenic characteristics of F-like and I-like sex pili are distinct2, so it seemed very probable, because F phages do not attach to I-like pili, that I-specific phages existed. These have now been isolated2, using as hosts bacteria carrying de-repressed (drd) mutants of fi- R factors6, the sex factors of which are known to be I-like2. Strains carrying these mutant R factors continually form sex pili and can therefore be used as indicators for the corresponding donor-specific phages.
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MEYNELL, G., LAWN, A. Filamentous Phages specific for the I Sex Factor. Nature 217, 1184–1186 (1968). https://doi.org/10.1038/2171184a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/2171184a0
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