Frontiers in Bioscience-Landmark (FBL) is published by IMR Press from Volume 26 Issue 5 (2021). Previous articles were published by another publisher on a subscription basis, and they are hosted by IMR Press on imrpress.com as a courtesy and upon agreement with Frontiers in Bioscience.
1 Public Health Research Institute, 225 Warren Street, Newark, NJ 07103, USA
Abstract
The ability to take up exogenous DNA is a requisite for genetic competence and transformation. Here we review the process of DNA transport in competent bacteria. Two kinds of machineries have been described. In the first one, the components show similarities to the proteins involved in biogenesis of type IV pili and type II secretion systems. The second one is related to the type IV secretion system and conjugation apparatus.
Keywords
- Competence
- Transformation
- DNA uptake
- Review