Observation on biological characters of Streptococcus mutans luxS gene knockout mutant strain

Objective To investigate the construction of Streptococcus mutans luxS gene knockout mutant which can act as the technical platform for following researches on luxS quorum sensing function in oral ecosystem.Methods Erythromycin resistance gene was inserted between two 1 kb fragments containing regions of DNA immediately upstream and downstream of the luxS translational start and stop codons.The resuhing construct was linearized and electro-transformed into Streptococcus mutans cells.After allelic exchange,the luxS gene knockout mutant strains were selected on 10μg/ml erythromycin plates,and compared the growth and biofilms formation of luxS knockout mutant with wild type strains.Results The luxSknockout mutant was confirmed by PCR,and it was also confirmed that this gene mutant could be stably passed through in vitro.The growth mode of luxS knockout mutant showed obvious difierences against that of wild type at stationary phase,the knockout mutant gained more bacteria cells growth.Conclusion Streptococcus mutans luxS gene has been successfully disrupted with allelic exchange.This mutant strains showed higher growth abilitv which could be the consequence of quorum sensing mutant. Key words: Streptococcus mutans; luxS gene; Homologous recombination