Fatty acids are an essential component of the phospholipids of the inner and outer membranes of Escherichia coli. The synthesis of both fatty acids and phospholipids is regulated. Synthesis increases when growth rate increases, is inhibited when starvation occurs, and the fatty acid composition of the membrane changes with growth temperature. Several
genes encoding enzymes involved in membrane synthesis are located in the rpmF-plsX-fab operon. In this operon, a gene encoding a phospholipid synthetic gene of unknown function, plsX, lies just downstream of the ribosomal protein gene rpmF and upstream of five fatty acid biosynthetic genes, fabH, fabD, fabG, acpP, and fabF. The operon is also complex; transcription is initiated from at least eight promoters.
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