Recent functional insights into the magic role of (p)ppGpp in growth control

作者：Mu, Haoyan; Han, Fei; Wang, Qian; Wang, Yanling; Dai, Xiongfeng^*; Zhu, Manlu^*

来源：Computational and Structural Biotechnology Journal, 2023, 21: 168-175.

DOI：10.1016/j.csbj.2022.11.063

• (p)ppGpp
• Growth control
• Resource allocation
• Bacteria
• Plant and green algaes

Rapid growth and survival are two key traits that enable bacterial cells to thrive in their natural habitat. The guanosine tetraphosphate and pentaphosphate [(p)ppGpp], also known as "magic spot", is a key sec-ond messenger inside bacterial cells as well as chloroplasts of plants and green algae. (p)ppGpp not only controls various stages of central dogma processes (replication, transcription, ribosome maturation and translation) and central metabolism but also regulates various physiological processes such as pathogen-esis, persistence, motility and competence. Under extreme conditions such as nutrient starvation, (p) ppGpp-mediated stringent response is crucial for the survival of bacterial cells. This mini-review high-lights some of the very recent progress on the key role of (p)ppGpp in bacterial growth control in light of cellular resource allocation and cell size regulation. We also briefly discuss some recent functional insights into the role of (p)ppGpp in plants and green algae from the angle of growth and development and further discuss several important open directions for future studies.(c) 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of Research Network of Computational and Structural Biotechnology. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creative-commons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).