Quorum Sensing
Groups of V. harveyi bacteria communicate via quorum sensing to coordinate the production of bioluminescense and virulence factors. Quorum sensing was first studied in Vibrio fischeri, a marine bacterium that uses a synthase (LuxI) to produce a species-specific autoinducer (AI) that binds a cognate receptor (LuxR) that regulates changes in expression. Coined "LuxI/R" quorum sensing, these systems have been identified in many other species of Gram-negative bacteria. Despite its relatedness to V. fischeri, V. harveyi lacks a LuxI/R quorum sensing system, and instead employs a hybrid quorum-sensing circuit, detecting its AI via a membrane-bound histidine kinase and using a phosphorelay to convert information about the population size to changes in gene expression. Since their identification in V. harveyi, such hybrid systems have been identified in many other bacterial species. It was also discovered that V. harveyi uses a second AI, termed autoinducer-2 or AI-2, which is unusual because it is made and detected by a variety of different bacteria, both Gram-negative and Gram-positive. Thus, V. harveyi has been instrumental to our understanding and appreciation of interspecies bacterial communication.
Read more about this topic: Vibrio Harveyi
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