show Abstracthide AbstractWithin the bacterial phylum of the Alphaproteobacteria many species show complex life cycles. Proper regulation of these life cycles requires cell cycle regulation pathways, one of which is the so-called CtrA pathway. Key factors in the CtrA pathway are the histidine kinase CckA and the phosphotransferase ChpT, which are directly involved in cell cycle specific activation of the response regulator CtrA. Within the Alphaproteobacteria, stalked budding bacteria are even more asymmetric than most other representatives. How they regulate their cell cycle has not been studied before. Here, we investigated the transcriptional profiles of Hyphomonas neptunium cells depleted of CckA or ChpT and compared their profiles to that of wildtype cells. We identified that the essential proteins CckA and ChpT influence the transcription levels of multiple essential processes, such as cell division, as well as specific cell cycle regulated functions such as motility. Overall design: mRNA profiles for H. neptunium wild-type cells or cells depleted of CckA or ChpT were generated in duplicate by next-generation sequencing, using an Illumina NextSeq 500 system with 75 bp read length and a "High 75" sequencing kit