Random transposon insertion in staphylococcus aureus and use thereof to identify essential genes

The library of claim a 38, wherein said electronic form is selected from the group consisting of magnetic storage media, such as a floppy disc, a hard disc storage medium, and a magnetic tape;

• optical storage media such as CD-ROM;
• electrical storage media such as RAM and ROM;
• hybrids of these categories such as magnetic/optical storage media;
• computer readable forms such as a word processing text file, database format, searchable files, executable files and search program software.

A method for identifying a library of putative essential or important genes using a High Throughput Transposon Insertion Database (HTTIM), comprising:

• a) mutagenizing a Staphylococcus genome with a transposon such that individual cells containing at least on transposon insertion are isolated;
• b) collecting and mapping said at least one transposon insertion in each individual cell so as to form a database of transposon insertion sites, or an HTTIM;
• c) comparing said database of transposon insertion sites with a database comprising the genomic sequence of the bacterium to identify open reading frames in said genomic sequence database that are not disrupted by a transposon insertion;
• and
• d) forming a library from said putative essential or important genes that are not disrupted by a transposon.