TY - JOUR AU - Hayward, Don AU - van Helden, Paul D. AU - Wiid, Ian JF PY - 2009 DA - 2009/02/26 TI - Glutamine synthetase sequence evolution in the mycobacteria and their use as molecular markers for Actinobacteriaspeciation JO - BMC Evolutionary Biology SP - 48 VL - 9 IS - 1 AB - Although the gene encoding for glutamine synthetase (glnA) is essential in several organisms, multiple glnA copies have been identified in bacterial genomes such as those of the phylum Actinobacteria, notably the mycobacterial species. Intriguingly, previous reports have shown that only one copy (glnA1) is essential for growth in M. tuberculosis, while the other copies (glnA2, glnA3 and glnA4) are not. SN - 1471-2148 UR - https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-9-48 DO - 10.1186/1471-2148-9-48 ID - Hayward2009 ER -