Does protein secretion activity vary during the cell cycle of Escherichia coli?

It is not known whether the activity of the Escherichia coli protein export system changes during the division cycle. To address and answer this question, we took two approaches. First, we pulse-labeled a random culture and size-fractionated the labeled cells in the presence of inhibitors of secretion. Second, we pulse-labeled synchronously growing cells at different phases in the cell cycle. In the latter experiment, we used a new method of synchronization in which a random culture was simply filtered through glass fiber filters. In both cases, the proportions of unprocessed precursor molecules were measured by immunoprecipitation and gel electrophoresis for some representative periplasmic and outer membrane proteins. Within the sensitivity limits of these methods, we could not detect any significant variation in the precursor labeling for cells of different ages. Thus, E. coli cells appear to secrete proteins continuously throughout the division cycle.