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PreprintCC BYbioRxiv

41% of Gram-negative bacteria encode a Type Six Secretion System

  • C. Zhang
  • H. Hassler
  • W. Ratcliff
  • L. Speare1
  • B. K. Hammer
  1. 1Georgia Institute of Technology
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Abstract

The type six secretion system (T6SS) is a highly studied, versatile bacterial nanoweapon that is important in bacterial pathogenesis and evolution. Despite extensive study, its prevalence remains poorly quantified. Analyzing 35,467 representative genomes, we find that approximately 41% of genomes in the average well-sampled Gram-negative genus (more than 30 sampled genomes) encode a T6SS. Further, we show that the distribution of the T6SS is patchy at all taxonomic levels. The uneven distribution we found is consistent with context-dependent selection, repeated evolutionary loss, or greater evolutionary lability. Our dataset provides a foundation for studying the drivers of T6SS distribution, and our pipeline enables similar surveys of other secretion systems, gene clusters, and multi-protein complexes across bacteria.

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Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@misc{zhang2026gramnegative,
  title = {{41% of Gram-negative bacteria encode a Type Six Secretion System}},
  author = {C. Zhang and H. Hassler and W. Ratcliff and L. Speare and B. K. Hammer},
  howpublished = {bioRxiv},
  year = {2026},
  month = nov,
  doi = {10.64898/2026.11.07.764895},
  url = {https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.11.07.764895v1},
  note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY  - UNPB
TI  - 41% of Gram-negative bacteria encode a Type Six Secretion System
AU  - C. Zhang
AU  - H. Hassler
AU  - W. Ratcliff
AU  - L. Speare
AU  - B. K. Hammer
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/11/07
PB  - bioRxiv
DO  - 10.64898/2026.11.07.764895
UR  - https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.11.07.764895v1
AB  - The type six secretion system (T6SS) is a highly studied, versatile bacterial nanoweapon that is important in bacterial pathogenesis and evolution. Despite extensive study, its prevalence remains poorly quantified. Analyzing 35,467 representative genomes, we find that approximately 41% of genomes in the average well-sampled Gram-negative genus (more than 30 sampled genomes) encode a T6SS. Further, we show that the distribution of the T6SS is patchy at all taxonomic levels. The uneven distribution we found is consistent with context-dependent selection, repeated evolutionary loss, or greater evolutionary lability. Our dataset provides a foundation for studying the drivers of T6SS distribution, and our pipeline enables similar surveys of other secretion systems, gene clusters, and multi-protein complexes across bacteria.
ER  -