Rv3395c Family assigned · medium auto-curated

H37Rv Rv3395c · MTBC0 mtbc0_003607 · 204 aa · 3836461–3837075 MTBC0 (-) · RefSeq NP_217912.2

Genomic neighbourhood (genome browser)

Open in full genome browser →

This gene (outlined) in its genomic context; arrows are neighbouring genes coloured by verdict. Click any gene to navigate. Pan and zoom in the full browser.

Annotation: from legacy to revised

Legacy (H37Rv / Mycobrowser)hypothetical protein
MTBC0 PGAP re-annotationhypothetical protein
Revised (this work)Contains MT3502_N (PF27531.1), Rv3395c_C (PF27314.1) domain(s); putative function inferred from the domain architecture.
Functional category (TubercuList)conserved hypotheticals

Auto-curated: this verdict and function were generated by rules from PGAP + Pfam + Foldseek and have not been hand-reviewed.

In the literature (TB corpus sweep) 1 publication

Found under: H37Rv (1).

1 TB publication mentions this gene. 1 publication(s) mention this gene (title/abstract), verified against the text. The atlas states the function; these are the primary sources that discuss it.

PublicationDate
Essential roles for imuA'- and imuB-encoded accessory factors in DnaE2-dependent mutagenesis in Mycobacterium tuberculosis. doi:10.1073/pnas.1002614107 2010

This layer CITES the literature, it does not change the verdict or the function. A gene may be heavily studied (as an antigen, a resistance determinant, a drug target) while its molecular function is settled elsewhere in the fiche. This distinguishes a gene that is dark because nobody has looked from one that is dark despite having been studied. Source: PubMed (whole), MULTI-ALIAS sweep: H37Rv locus tag AND every ortholog identifier (M. bovis Mb…, M. marinum MMAR_…, M. smegmatis MSMEG_…, M. leprae ML…, M. abscessus MAB_…), each hit VERIFIED against the abstract text (word-boundary regex). phase73/phase75, 2026-07-13.

Intrinsic disorder (sequence + structure) partially disordered

Predicted disorder29% of residues (metapredict) · mean AlphaFold pLDDT 82.6
Disordered regions2 IDR(s), longest 56 aa [0-56, 185-204]

carries a substantial disordered region (75/204 residues); disorder is a property, not a function

A property (biophysics), not a function. No LLPS/condensate claim is made from disorder alone. Verdict unchanged. Source: metapredict v3 (Emenecker/Holehouse) per-residue disorder + AlphaFold mean pLDDT (annotation_mtbc P16.13).

Genomic-neighbour overlap (structural caveat) co-directional · 1 % of gene

NeighbourdinB_2 (Rv3394c, - strand)
Overlap4 bp, 1 % of this gene's length

co-directional overlap: ordinary (e.g. shared stop/start codons in an operon), not the Rv2438A-type artefact P20.1, derived from GFF3 gene coordinates, 2026-08-03.

Conditional expression context (iModulons)

Member of 1 independently-modulated gene set(s): WhiB4 (whiB4).

iModulon membership (independently-modulated gene sets from a 647-sample RNA-seq compendium): the conditional co-expression context. Co-expression is a regulatory context, NOT a molecular function. Source: iModulonDB / modulome_mtb (Yoo 2022).

CRISPRi vulnerability

Vulnerability index 0.31 (95% CI -0.82 to 1.95). A more negative index = more vulnerable to knockdown (better drug-target quality); indicative threshold VI ≤ -6 = highly vulnerable.

Quantitative CRISPRi knockdown, graded (finer than binary Tn-seq essentiality). Source: CRISPRi vulnerability index (Bosch 2021, pebble.rockefeller.edu).

Legacy record & comparison (Mycobrowser)

Mycobrowser functionFunction unknown

The legacy Mycobrowser record is shown for verification. Mycobrowser is no longer maintained; its EC numbers predate recent nomenclature revisions, so a class change usually reflects re-numbering, not a conflict.

Orthologues (reciprocal best hits across mycobacteria)

M. bovis Mb3427c · 99.0% identity
M. marinum MMAR_1150 · 77.2% identity
M. smegmatis MSMEG_1620 · 64.9% identity
M. orygis RJtmp_003495 · 99.0% identity
M. abscessus MAB_3713c · 56.1% identity

Reciprocal-best-hit orthologues (DIAMOND) against the Mycobrowser reference proteomes. A missing species is informative: e.g. a gene absent from M. leprae was likely lost in its reductive genome evolution. Locus tags link to Mycobrowser.

Curated reference (UniProt)

UniProt P9WKZ9 SwissProt · reviewed · Evidence at protein level
UniProt nameUncharacterized protein Rv3395c

UniProt still lists this protein as Uncharacterized protein Rv3395c; the revised annotation above is ahead of the current UniProt record.

Functional vocabulary (eggNOG-mapper, orthology transfer)

COG category S Function unknown
eggNOG descriptionComponent of the SOS system and an inhibitor of cell division. Accumulation of SulA causes rapid cessation of cell division and the appearance of long, non-septate filaments. In the presence of GTP, binds a polymerization-competent form of FtsZ in a 1 1 ratio, thus inhibiting FtsZ polymerization and therefore preventing it from participating in the assembly of the Z ring. This mechanism prevents the premature segregation of damaged DNA to daughter cells during cell division
Orthologous groupCOG4544
Gene Ontology (22) GO:0006139, GO:0006259, GO:0006281, GO:0006725, GO:0006807, GO:0006950, GO:0006974, GO:0008150, GO:0008152, GO:0009987, GO:0033554, GO:0034641 +10 more

Orthology-based transfer (eggNOG 5.0.2, diamond). EC/KO/GO/CAZy are computed annotations, not manual curation; cross-check against the primary literature before treating a specific reaction as established.

Conservation & selection (intra-MTBC, 145 209 strains)

pN/pS 1.232 · diversifying/relaxed
Polymorphic sites (≥ 0.1% of strains) 1 synonymous, 3 missense, 0 nonsense, 0 frameshift

pN/pS from segregating SNPs (singletons removed) normalised by possible sites. Low pN/pS = purifying selection (a strong signal that a "hypothetical" is a real, constrained gene). A high pN/pS is ambiguous: relaxed constraint or positive selection (drug resistance, antigenic variation) inflate it; e.g. rpoB/katG/pncA score high here for resistance, not loss of function. A clonal disruption (one allele over a clade) suggests lineage pseudogenisation; a convergent one (many independent alleles) is typical of resistance loss-of-function.

Outgroup conservation (beyond the MTBC) Corynebacteriales

M. canettii dN/dS (deep-divergence selection) inf (low power) · 1 consensus substitution(s)
low power (1 canettii-consensus substitution(s)); present in M. canettii but dN/dS not reliable
Genus-wide presence (~53 non-MTBC Mycobacterium) present in 52/53 (98%) · mean identity 72.1% · 4/4 closest MTBAP relatives
conserved across the genus (present in 52/53 non-MTBC Mycobacterium genomes, incl. distant relatives) — an ancient core gene predating the genus radiation
Phylostratum (deepest detected homolog) MTBC-specific Mycobacterium Mycobacteriaceae Corynebacteriales Actinomycetia Bacteria
detected in 6/13 non-Mycobacterium reference genomes (down to Corynebacteriales) · mean identity 49.0%
detected across the order Corynebacteriales (Corynebacterium/Nocardia/Rhodococcus/…) but not in more distant Actinomycetia — a Corynebacteriales-level gene

Two orthogonal outgroup signals. M. canettii (the immediate outgroup) gives a deep-divergence dN/dS (a low value confirms a constrained, real gene; shown as confident only at ≥8 substitutions, else flagged low-power). Genus-wide presence/absence (tblastn vs assembled non-MTBC genomes) places the gene on the ancient-core ↔ MTBC-specific axis: a gene absent even from the closest MTBAP relatives is a candidate MTBC-specific innovation (possible host-adaptation factor, to confirm by synteny). The phylostratum extends that axis outside the genus (tblastn vs 13 reference genomes spanning Mycobacteriaceae → Corynebacteriales → Actinomycetia → outside the phylum): it is the deepest clade in which a homolog is still detected, i.e. a proxy for gene age. Read it with the null model in mind: a shallow (young) stratum can also reflect homology-detection failure for short or fast-evolving ORFs, so it is a descriptive axis, not a proof of novelty.

Essentiality (transposon mutagenesis)

DeJesus 2017 callNE · non-essential
What the call meansnon-essential
TA sites (Himar1) 4 in the ORF — 0 in the essential state, 0 growth-defect, 4 non-essential, 0 growth-advantage. Saturation 1.000, mean read count 52.25. A region of the protein devoid of TA sites is invisible to this assay: nothing can be inferred about it, in either direction.
CaveatStatistically thin call: only 4 TA (Himar1) sites in the whole ORF (atlas median 13; genes under 300 nt typically have very few). A DeJesus 2017 call built on so few independent observations is less robust than the same call on a longer gene, in either direction. Cross-check against the CRISPRi vulnerability index (independent of TA-site density) and, if this gene overlaps a neighbour (see Genomic-neighbour overlap section below), verify how many of its TA sites actually fall inside its own ORF. (P20.3)

Genome-wide Himar1 transposon essentiality in H37Rv (DeJesus 2017). An essential call (ES/ESD/GD) is strong, independent evidence that a "hypothetical" locus encodes a functional, selectively required gene — orthogonal to intra-species conservation.

Proteomics (mass spectrometry) detected

MS detectiondetected in 1 of 16 independent MS datasets
Integrated abundance0.02 ppm · rank 3509/3519 (0.3th percentile)

Detection by mass spectrometry is direct, experimental evidence that the protein product exists — orthogonal to sequence conservation and to Tn-seq essentiality, and especially decisive for a "hypothetical" locus. Reproducible detection across several independent datasets (PaxDb) makes the existence claim robust; the integrated abundance places the protein in the proteome's dynamic range.

Physico-chemical properties (computed, ProtParam)

Length204 aa
Molecular weight20.8 kDa
Theoretical pI10.19
GRAVY0.228 (hydrophobic)
Aliphatic index107.5
Aromaticity0.015
Instability index34.0 (stable)

Computed from the ancestral MTBC0 sequence with the ExPASy ProtParam method (Biopython). Descriptive biophysical context: a positive GRAVY flags a hydrophobic (often membrane) protein, a high instability index (>40) predicts a short in-vitro half-life, an extreme pI hints at compartment or binding partner.

Domains (Pfam, hmmscan --cut_ga)

PfamAccessioni-EvalueResiduesDescription
MT3502_NPF27531.1 4.6e-3649–163 MT3502 N-terminal domain
Rv3395c_CPF27314.1 8.7e-19166–204 Rv3395c C-terminal domain

Structural search (AlphaFold DB model, Foldseek vs PDB — genome-wide) pLDDT 82.6

PDB hitprobTM-scoreE-valueDescription
4zc0-assembly1_B 1.00 0.47 2.8e-05 sig 4zc0-assembly1_B Structure of a dodecameric bacterial helicase
1oft-assembly1_A 1.00 0.63 8.9e-04 sig 1oft-assembly1_A Crystal structure of SulA from Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Foldseek search of the AlphaFold DB model (mean pLDDT 82.6, gated at 70) against the PDB — a genome-wide extension of the ESMFold dark-gene search that also covers proteins beyond the single-sequence length limit. Confident structural neighbours (E < 0.01) shown.

Genomic context (neighbours & predicted operon) operon of 2

Upstream (5' on genome)Rv3394c (- strand, -4 bp gap)
Downstream (3' on genome)Rv3395A (+ strand, 82 bp gap)
Predicted operon Rv3394c · Rv3395c

Neighbours from the H37Rv annotation (- strand). The operon is predicted by co-directional intergenic distance (same strand, gaps ≤50 bp) — a transcription-unit hypothesis, not a mapped TSS. For a "hypothetical", co-transcription with a characterised operon is a concrete functional lead (complements the STRING neighborhood channel below).

Functional interaction network (STRING v12, guilt-by-association)

Explore full network →

Node colour = verdict, dashed = hypothetical; edge colour = evidence (green experimental, orange genomic-context, grey co-expression), width ∝ score. Click a partner to open its page; "Explore full network" to walk the graph.

Closest characterised functional partner: dnaE2 (error-prone DNA polymerase), high confidence from genomic context alone (score 879 excluding text-mining). This association is the citable seed of a function hypothesis for this hypothetical protein.

PartnerProductScoreNo text-miningChannels (≥400)
Rv3394c hyp hypothetical protein 999 998 ctx neighborhood:882 cooccurence:772 coexpression:936 textmining:661
Rv3370c dnaE2 error-prone DNA polymerase 958 879 ctx cooccurence:762 coexpression:432 textmining:671
Rv1537 dinX DNA polymerase IV 761 704 coexpression:693
Rv3056 dinP DNA polymerase IV 2 730 701 coexpression:690
Rv3395A membrane protein 948 617 ctx neighborhood:615 textmining:870
Rv3396c guaA GMP synthase 546 546 ctx neighborhood:544
Rv0513 transmembrane protein 507 507 ctx cooccurence:500
Rv1547 dnaE1 DNA polymerase III subunit alpha 522 444 coexpression:412
Rv1249c membrane protein 427 427 ctx cooccurence:409
Rv2560 hyp hypothetical protein 418 418 ctx cooccurence:418
Rv3196 hyp hypothetical protein 415 415 ctx cooccurence:413
Rv1696 recN DNA repair protein RecN 559 410 coexpression:410
Rv3776 hyp hypothetical protein 513 410
Rv2100 hyp hypothetical protein 879 409 textmining:804
Rv0784 hyp hypothetical protein 401 401

STRING combines evidence channels (neighborhood, fusion, cooccurrence, coexpression, experimental, database, text-mining) into a 0–1000 score. The ctx badge marks edges carried by the genomic-context channels (conserved neighborhood, fusion, phylogenetic co-occurrence), which are independent of orthology and structure and the strongest signal for an unknown gene. The exp badge marks an experimentally-supported partner (measured interaction, experimental/database channel ≥400) as opposed to a purely predicted one — but note that the M. tuberculosis experimental interactome is dominated by a noisy bacterial-two-hybrid screen, so a strong measured link that contradicts the operon/localisation context is likely a false positive. The no text-mining column recomputes the score from data alone, so a link that does not depend on the literature is visible. Association is a function hypothesis, not proof: corroborate with the operon context and the primary literature before assigning a function.

Evidence

  • Legacy H37Rv annotation: hypothetical protein
  • MTBC0 PGAP product: hypothetical protein
  • Pfam (hmmscan --cut_ga): MT3502_N PF27531.1 (E=5e-36), Rv3395c_C PF27314.1 (E=9e-19)
  • (auto-curated by rules from PGAP + Pfam + Foldseek; not hand-reviewed)

Sources

  • Ancestral sequence & coordinates: Harrison LB et al. (2024), An imputed ancestral reference genome for the MTBC, doi:10.1101/2023.09.07.556366
  • Product annotation: NCBI PGAP on MTBC0; legacy from H37Rv NC_000962.3 (RefSeq NP_217912.2)
  • Domains: Pfam-A via hmmscan --cut_ga — MT3502_N (PF27531.1), Rv3395c_C (PF27314.1)
  • Sequence-level signal: ESM Atlas (EvolutionaryScale × BioHub) — exploratory
  • Controlled vocabulary: eggNOG-mapper 2.1.12 (Cantalapiedra et al. 2021, doi:10.1093/molbev/msab293), eggNOG 5.0 DB (Huerta-Cepas et al. 2019) — OG COG4544
  • Curated reference: UniProt P9WKZ9 (SwissProt, reviewed; Evidence at protein level)
  • Intra-MTBC selection: pN/pS and disruption from SPDI variants of 145 209 MTBC strains (this work, local collection vs H37Rv NC_000962.3)
  • Genome-wide structure: AlphaFold DB model (Jumper et al. 2021, doi:10.1038/s41586-021-03819-2; Varadi et al. 2024, doi:10.1093/nar/gkad1011) searched vs PDB with Foldseek (mean pLDDT 82.6)
  • Interaction network: STRING v12.0 (Szklarczyk et al. 2023, doi:10.1093/nar/gkac1000), taxon 83332, CC-BY 4.0 — 29 functional partner(s); context anchor dnaE2
  • Essentiality: genome-wide transposon mutagenesis in H37Rv — DeJesus et al. 2017 (mBio, doi:10.1128/mBio.02133-16, CC BY)
  • Proteomics: integrated mass-spectrometry abundance from PaxDb 5.0 (Huang et al. 2023, doi:10.1016/j.mcpro.2023.100640), taxon 83332 — weighted average of 16 datasets, incl. Schubert et al. 2013 (doi:10.1016/j.chom.2013.04.008) and Albrethsen et al. 2013 (doi:10.1074/mcp.M112.018846)
  • Functional category: TubercuList scheme (Cole et al. 1998, doi:10.1038/31159), via Mycobrowser (Kapopoulou et al. 2011, doi:10.1016/j.tube.2010.09.006)
  • Orthologues: reciprocal best hits (DIAMOND, Buchfink et al. 2021, doi:10.1038/s41592-021-01101-x) against Mycobrowser release 5 reference proteomes
  • Genomic context / operon: H37Rv annotation; operon predicted by co-directional intergenic distance (Salgado et al. 2000, doi:10.1073/pnas.030539397)
  • Physico-chemical properties: ExPASy ProtParam method via Biopython (Gasteiger et al. 2005), computed from the MTBC0 sequence
  • Primary literature: none located yet; annotation rests on the domain/homology sources above.

Ancestral MTBC0 protein sequence

>mtbc0_003607|Rv3395c|
MTVAFASDQRLENGAEQLESLRRQMALLSEKVSGGPSRSGDLVPAGPVSLPPGTVGVLSGARSLLLSMVASVTAAGGNAAIVGQPDIGLLAAVEMGADLSRLAVIPDPGTDPVEVAAVLIDGMDLVVLGLGGRRVTRARARAVVARARQKGCTLLVTDGDWQGVSTRLAARVCGYEITPALRGVPTPGLGRISGVRLQINGRGR