Conservation of chromosomal arrangement among three strains of the genetically unstable archaeon Halobacterium salinarium

Abstract

Phenotypic variants of Halobacterium salinarium NRC-1 arise at a frequency of 10(-2). These result from transpositions of halobacterial insertion sequences and rearrangements mediated by halobacterial insertion sequences. We have tested the hypothesis that such mutations are confined to only a portion of the genome by comparing the chromosomal restriction map of H. salinarium NRC-1 and that of the derivative S9, which was made in 1969. The two chromosomes were mapped by using two-dimensional pulsed-field gel electrophoresis and the restriction enzymes AflII, AseI, and DraI. A comparison of the two deduced maps showed a domain of about 210 kbp to be subject to many rearrangements, including an inversion in S9 relative to NRC-1. However, the rest of the chromosome was conserved among NRC-1, S9, and an independent Halobacterium isolate, GRB, previously mapped by St. Jean et al. (A. St. Jean, B. A. Trieselmann, and R. L. Charlebois, Nucleic Acids Res. 22:1476-1483, 1994). This concurs with data from eubacteria suggesting strong selective forces maintaining gene order even in the face of rearrangement events occurring at a high frequency.