{"doi":"10.1111/mmi.14879","title":"A non‐native C‐terminal extension of the β’ subunit compromises <scp>RNA</scp> polymerase and Rho functions","abstract":"Escherichia coli RfaH abrogates Rho-mediated polarity in lipopolysaccharide core biosynthesis operons, and ΔrfaH cells are hypersensitive to antibiotics, bile salts, and detergents. Selection for rfaH suppressors that restore growth on SDS identified a temperature-sensitive mutant in which 46 C-terminal residues of the RNA polymerase (RNAP) β' subunit are replaced with 23 residues carrying a net positive charge. Based on similarity to rpoC397, which confers a temperature-sensitive phenotype and resistance to bacteriophages, we named this mutant rpoC397*. We show that SDS resistance depends on a single nonpolar residue within the C397* tail, whereas basic residues are dispensable. In line with its mimicry of RfaH, C397* RNAP is resistant to Rho but responds to pause signals, NusA, and NusG in vitro similarly to the wild-type enzyme and binds to Rho and Nus factors in vivo. Strikingly, the deletion of rpoZ, which encodes the ω \"chaperone\" subunit, restores rpoC397* growth at 42°C but has no effect on SDS sensitivity. Our results suggest that the C397* tail traps the ω subunit in an inhibitory state through direct contacts and hinders Rho-dependent termination through long-range interactions. We propose that the dynamic and hypervariable β'•ω module controls RNA synthesis in response to niche-specific signals.","journal":"Molecular Microbiology","year":2022,"id":288457,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":1,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9527,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":514554,"name":"Bing Wang","orcid":"0000-0003-1265-9526","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":270919,"name":"Nelly Said","orcid":"0000-0001-8352-5555","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":969260,"name":"Daniela Gjorgjevikj","orcid":"0000-0002-9581-8440","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":270928,"name":"M.C. Wahl","orcid":"0000-0002-2811-5307","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":270927,"name":"Irina Artsimovitch","orcid":"0000-0002-8604-0980","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":969674,"name":"Maura Mittermeier","orcid":null,"position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":72,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T00:30:14.968626Z","pmid":"35049093","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}