Organization and Transcription of the Gluconate Operon, Gnt, of Bacillus Subtilis

The gluconate (gnt) operon of Bacillus subtilis has been cloned and sequenced. Analysis of the sequence (5482 base pairs) revealed four open reading frames, each of which was preceded by a Shine-Dalgarno sequence. These four frames were designated from the 5'-end as gntR, gntK, gntP, and gntZ. The gntR and gntK genes overlapped by 5 bases. The gntK and gntP gene products (consisting of 513 and 448 amino acids) were identified as gluconate kinase and permease, respectively, by means of insertional inactivation and deletion analysis of these genes subcloned in plasmid pC194. The functions of the gntR and gntZ gene products (243 and 468 amino acids) are presently unknown. S1 nuclease mapping and subcloning in a promoter probe vector (pPL603B) provided evidence that the gnt operon was transcribed as a polycistronic mRNA. Besides the gnt promoter about 40 base pairs upstream of the gntR gene, we detected two overlapping internal promoters between the gntP and gntZ genes. The gnt transcripts terminate about 45 base pairs downstream of the gntZ gene.