The Eno Gene of Burkholderia cenocepacia Strain 71-2 is Involved in Phosphate Solubilization

Bacterial strain 71-2 with phosphate-solubilizing activity was isolated from tobacco rhizosphere and classified as Burkholderia cenocepacia based on sequence analyses of 16S rRNA and recA genes. To learn phosphate-solubilizing mechanisms of 71-2, mutants showing reduced solubilizing phosphate activity were obtained using the EZ-Tn5 transposon. Mutant 71-2-MT51 was reduced in the solubilizing phosphate content to 34.36% as compared with the wild-type strain 71-2. The disrupted gene in 71-2-MT51 was cloned and sequenced, and the putative protein from the gene shared 65.26% identity to protein sequences of enolase from Escherichia coli, which suggests the gene encodes an enzyme of enolase. Complementation analyzing showed that Eno was responsible for phosphate solubilizing for B. cenocepacia strain 71-2. To our knowledge, this is the first report of Eno involved in phosphate solubilizing in B. cenocepacia as well as in other bacteria.