Rickettsia prowazekii transports UMP and GMP, but not CMP, as building blocks for RNA synthesis.
Rickettsia prowazekii, the etiological agent of epidemic typhus, is an obligate intracellular bacterium and is apparently unable to synthesize ribonucleotides de novo. Here, we show that as an alternative, isolated, purified R. prowazekii organisms transported exogenous uridyl- and guanylribonucleotides and incorporated these labeled precursors into their RNA in a rifampin-sensitive manner. Transport systems for nucleotides, which we have shown previously and show here are present in rickettsiae, have never been reported in free-living bacteria, and the usual nucleobase and nucleoside transport systems are absent in rickettsiae. There was a clear preference for the monophosphate form of ribonucleotides as the transported substrate. In contrast, rickettsiae did not transport cytidylribonucleotides. The source of rickettsial CTP appears to be the transport of UMP followed by its phosphorylation and the amination of intrarickettsial UTP to CTP by CTP synthetase. A complete schema of nucleotide metabolism in rickettsiae is presented that is based on a combination of biochemical, physiological, and genetic information.