Relationship of plasmids responsible for hairy root and crown gall tumorigenicity

Three strains of Agrobacterium rhizogenes were examined for plasmids. Strains 15834 and A4 contained essentially identical large plasmids, pAr15834c and pArA4c, respectively (approximately 260 x 10(6) daltons). These plasmids can dissociate to two smaller plasmid species. Strain TR105 contained only a single plasmid, which was homologous with the dissociation product of pAr15834c, pAr15834b. Plasmid pAr15834c shared little overall sequence homology with other Ti plasmids. One region of conserved homology between pAr15834c and a region of the octopine type plasmid pTiB6806 which contains oncogenicity functions was detected. Lower levels of homology were detected with sequences which are distributed throughout 65% of pTiB6806. Homology with the so-called common deoxyribonucleic acid in the integrated plasmid deoxyribonucleic acid region was detected only after lowering the stringency of hybridization (Tm, -41 degrees C). Furthermore, the A. rhizogenes plasmid is compatible with other Ti plasmids. Therefore, the results suggest that the virulence plasmids of A. rhizogenes are functionally similar to other Ti plasmids, yet have diverged sufficiently from an ancestral Ti plasmid that they now represent a distinct plasmid type based on homology, compatibility, and virulence.