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Mutations To Antibiotic Resistance During Stringent Response In B. Subtilis, Chad Hansen, Ronald E. Yasbin, Eduardo A. Robleto

Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP)

The relA gene in Bacillus subtilis controls a variety of factors during the stringent response which is a response to starvation of amino acids. The stringent response inhibits DNA synthesis and transcription of genes of tRNA, rRNA, and ribosomal proteins and promotes synthesis of the required amino acids. The objective of my project is to determine if a strain of B. subtilis that has a knockout mutation for the relA gene will accumulate a higher number of mutations that confer resistance to antibiotics that inhibit translation. It is proposed that because the relA gene inhibits transcription of ribosomal proteins, a …