Characterization of a small plasmid (pMBCP) from bovine Pseudomonas pickettii that confers cadmium resistance

This is the first report of isolation of Pseudomonas pickettii from a normal adult bovine duodenum. This organism was one of several bacteria isolated as part of a study to examine cadmium resistance genes (cad(r)) for use in generating transgenic plants to reclaim cadmium-contaminated soils in Kansas. P. pickettii containing a plasmid of 2.2kb (designated pMBCP) grew in Luria-Bertani broth and agar containing up to 800 microM of cadmium chloride and was resistant to 16 antibiotics. Curing the organism of plasmid revealed that antibiotic resistances were not plasmid-mediated. Low-level cadmium resistance was conferred by the plasmid because uncured organism grew significantly better (P<0.05) at 55 microM compared to cured organism. Both plasmid and chromosomal DNA were probed by DNA-DNA hybridization for the presence of known cadmium resistance genes (cadA, cadC, and cadD from Gram-positive (Staphylococcus aureus), but none were detected. The plasmid had one restriction site each for BamHI, PstI, SmaI, and XhoI; two sites each for HincII, SacI, and SphI; and multiple sites for AluI and XcmI. DNA sequence analyses of the cloned and original plasmids showed a GC content of greater than 60% and no homology to any published sequences in the GenBank, European Bioinformatics Institute, or Japanese Genome Net databases. The DNA sequence is contained in GenBank accession number AF144733. Thus, pMBCP offers low-level cadmium resistance to P. picketttii.