Effect of growth conditions on sucrose phosphotransferase activity of Streptococcus mutans

Sucrose and glucose phosphoenolpyruvate-dependent phosphotransferase (PTS) activities were studied in growing cultures of Streptococcus mutans serotype c and d/g cells adapted to either glucose or sucrose. Both acid production and optical absorbance were used to monitor growth in pH-controlled defined growth medium. The sucrose PTS activity appeared to be significant only under conditions of substrate limitation or slow growth as a result of low environmental pH. However, under environmental conditions which permitted rapid growth sucrose PTS activity appeared to be repressed, and only when the cells approached substrate-limited stationary phase after growth on high sucrose-supplemented medium was significant sucrose PTS activity again observed. A mutant apparently defective in sucrose PTS activity grew rapidly and produced acid under conditions of high environmental sucrose level but showed no sucrose PTS activity when the culture approached stationary phase. The mutant, however, after adaptation to glucose, demonstrated significant glucose PTS once the culture had attained the stationary growth phase. During diauxie growth in the presence of glucose and sucrose, there were sequential apparent inductions and repressions of glucose and sucrose PTS activities corresponding to decreases and increases of growth rate on the two substrates. Thus, S. mutans possesses at least two transport mechanisms for each substrate studied. One system (PTS) functions under conditions permitting slow growth and another functions under conditions permitting rapid growth.