Effects of carbon source and growth rate on cell wall composition of Bacillus subtilis subsp. niger

A study was made to determine whether factors other than the availability of phosphorus were involved in the regulation of synthesis of teichoic and teichuronic acids in Bacillus subtilis subsp. niger WM. First, the nature of the carbon source was varied while the dilution rate was maintained at about 0.3 h-1. Irrespective of whether the carbon source was glucose, glycerol, galactose, or malate, teichoic acid was the main anionic wall polymer whenever phosphorus was present in excess of the growth requirement, and teichuronic acid predominated in the walls of phosphate-limited cells. The effect of growth rate was studied by varying the dilution rate. However, only under phosphate limitation did the wall composition change with the growth rate: walls prepared from cells grown at dilution rates above 0.5 h-1 contained teichoic as well as teichuronic acid, despite the culture still being phosphate limited. The wall content of the cells did not vary with the nature of the growth limitation, but a correlation was observed between the growth rate and wall content. No indications were obtained that the composition of the peptidoglycan of B. subtilis subsp. niger WM was phenotypically variable.