Temporal Regulation of the Bacillus subtilis Acetylome and Evidence for a Role of MreB Acetylation in Cell Wall Growth

Abstract

The past decade highlighted <i>N</i>^ε-lysine acetylation as a prevalent posttranslational modification in bacteria. However, knowledge regarding the physiological importance and temporal regulation of acetylation has remained limited. To uncover potential regulatory roles for acetylation, we analyzed how acetylation patterns and abundances change between growth phases in <i>B. subtilis</i>. To demonstrate that the identification of cell growth-dependent modifications can point to critical regulatory acetylation events, we further characterized MreB, the cell shape-determining protein. Our findings led us to propose a role for MreB acetylation in controlling cell width by restricting cell wall growth.