Adaptive acidification tolerance response of Salmonella typhimurium

Salmonella typhimurium can encounter a wide variety of environments during its life cycle. One component of the environment which will fluctuate widely is pH. In nature, S. typhimurium can experience and survive dramatic acid stresses that occur in diverse ecological niches ranging from pond water to phagolysosomes. However, in vitro the organism is very sensitive to acid. To provide an explanation for how this organism survives acid in natural environments, the adaptive ability of S. typhimurium to become acid tolerant was tested. Logarithmically grown cells (pH 7.6) shifted to mild acid (pH 5.8) for one doubling as an adaptive procedure were 100 to 1,000 times more resistant to subsequent strong acid challenge (pH 3.3) than were unadapted cells shifted directly from pH 7.6 to 3.3. This acidification tolerance response required protein synthesis and appears to be a specific defense mechanism for acid. No cross protection was noted for hydrogen peroxide, SOS, or heat shock. Two-dimensional polyacrylamide gel electrophoretic analysis of acid-regulated polypeptides revealed 18 proteins with altered expression, 6 of which were repressed while 12 were induced by mild acid shifts. An avirulent phoP mutant was 1,000-fold more sensitive to acid than its virulent phoP+ parent, suggesting a correlation between acid tolerance and virulence. The Mg2(+)-dependent proton-translocating ATPase was also found to play an important role in acid tolerance. Mutants (unc) lacking this activity were unable to mount an acid tolerance response and were extremely acid sensitive. In contrast to these acid-sensitive mutants, a constitutively acid-tolerant mutant (atr) was isolated from wild-type LT2 after prolonged acid exposure. This mutant overexpressed several acidification tolerance response polypeptides. The data presented reveal an important acidification defense modulon with broad significance toward survival in biologically hostile environments.