Perspectives on Bacterial Flagellar Motor

Dear Colleagues,

The bacterial flagellum is a supramolecular motility machinery that allows bacterial cells to migrate towards more favourable conditions and to escape from undesirable conditions in viscous liquid environments for their survival and/or infection. The bacterial flagellum also acts as a biosensor to detect changes in their environment to switch their life cycle from planktonic cells to the formation of a biofilm society. The flagellum consists of at least three parts: the basal body (reversible rotary motor), the hook (universal joint) and the filament (helical propeller). The bacterial flagellar motor composed of a rotor ring and a dozen stators is powered by an electrochemical-potential difference of specific ions across the cytoplasmic membrane and rotates in either the counterclockwise (CCW) or clockwise (CW) direction. A sensory signal transduction pathway regulates the switching between the CCW and CW states of the motor in response to environmental stimuli. Recently, it has been revealed that the bacterial flagellar motor induces structural remodeling of itself in response to changes in the environment to exert the motor function under different conditions.

The core structure of the bacterial flagellum is conserved among bacterial species. However, recent structural analyses of intact flagellar structures derived from various bacterial species by electron cryotomography and subtomogram averaging have shown that novel and divergent structures surround the core structure, suggesting that the flagellar motors have adapted to function in various environments of the habitat of bacteria.

This Special Issue of Biomolecules is dedicated to covering recent advances in our understanding of and perspectives on the flagellar motor derived from different bacterial species. Our aim is to compile a Special Issue describing recent advances in the structure and function of the bacterial flagellar motor.

Dr. Tohru Minamino
Prof. Keiichi Namba
Guest Editors

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