TRANSFER OF ATTACHING AND EFFACING CAPACITY FROM A STRAIN OF ENTEROPATHOGENIC ESCHERICHIA-COLI TO ESCHERICHIA-COLI K-12

The ability to cause attaching and effacing (AE) lesions in intestinal epithelial cells is an essential virulence trait of enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC) that requires several chromosomal genes acting in conce rt with one another. In this study, we show that the ability to cause AE lesions can be transferred by conjugal mating from a high frequency recombinant (Hfr) derivative of a rabbit EPEC strain, E. coli RDEC-1, to a strain of E. coli K-12. Although the recipient acquired a consid erable amount of donor DNA during the transfer process, it expressed t he AE phenotype only weakly. The findings suggest that AE is a multige ne phenomenon, the genes for which may not reside on a single region o f the bacterial chromosome.