Genetic analysis of Bacillus subtilis spo mutations generated by Tn917-mediated insertional mutagenesis

Mutations that cause sporulation defects (spo mutations) often identify developmentally regulated transcription units or genes whose products are required for the expression of sporulation-specific regulons. We report here the isolation, genetic analysis and phenotypic characterization of spo mutations produced by insertional mutagenesis with transposon Tn917, a form of mutagenesis that facilitates genetic and physical manipulation of mutated genes in many ways. Twenty-four insertional spo mutations were studied in detail. On the basis of transformation-mediated and transduction-mediated linkage analysis and a range of phenotypic tests, these mutations were assigned to 20 distinct loci, at least 9 of which are different from the 40 previously described spo loci. The insertional mutations caused blocks at a variety of different stages of sporulation, and therefore probably identify genes active at different times during sporulation. In addition to increasing substantially the total of known spo loci, we anticipate that this collection will include representatives of many of the temporally regulated sets of genes that comprise the overall program of sporulation-specific gene activation in Bacillus subtilis. Given the kinds of manipulations that are possible with genes disrupted by Tn917 insertions, this should significantly facilitate efforts to understand the regulation of these gene sets.