Production of the Type IV Secretion System Differs among Brucella Species as Revealed with VirB5- and VirB8-Specific Antisera

AUTOR(ES)

Rouot, Bruno

FONTE

American Society for Microbiology

RESUMO

Expression of the virB operon, encoding the type IV secretion system required for Brucella suis virulence, occurred in the acidic phagocytic vacuoles of macrophages and could be induced in minimal medium at acidic pH values. To analyze the production of VirB proteins, polyclonal antisera against B. suis VirB5 and VirB8 were generated. Western blot analysis revealed that VirB5 and VirB8 were detected after 3 h in acidic minimal medium and that the amounts increased after prolonged incubation. Unlike what occurs in the related organism Agrobacterium tumefaciens, the periplasmic sugar binding protein ChvE did not contribute to VirB protein production, and B. suis from which chvE was deleted was fully virulent in a mouse model. Comparative analyses of various Brucella species revealed that in all of them VirB protein production increased under acidic conditions. However, in rich medium at neutral pH, Brucella canis and B. suis, as well as the Brucella abortus- and Brucella melitensis-derived vaccine strains S19, RB51, and Rev.1, produced no VirB proteins or only small amounts of VirB proteins, whereas the parental B. abortus and B. melitensis strains constitutively produced VirB5 and VirB8. Thus, the vaccine strains were still able to induce virB expression under acidic conditions, but the VirB protein production was markedly different from that in the wild-type strains at pH 7. Taken together, the data indicate that VirB protein production and probably expression of the virB operon are not uniformly regulated in different Brucella species. Since VirB proteins were shown to modulate Brucella phagocytosis and intracellular trafficking, the differential regulation of the production of these proteins reported here may provide a clue to explain their role(s) during the infection process.

Documentos Relacionados

• Structures of two core subunits of the bacterial type IV secretion system, VirB8 from Brucella suis and ComB10 from Helicobacter pylori
• Agrobacterium tumefaciens VirB6 Protein Participates in Formation of VirB7 and VirB9 Complexes Required for Type IV Secretion
• Predicted hexameric structure of the Agrobacterium VirB4 C terminus suggests VirB4 acts as a docking site during type IV secretion
• Structural and functional characterization of the VirB5 protein from the type IV secretion system encoded by the conjugative plasmid pKM101
• The Agrobacterium T-DNA Transport Pore Proteins VirB8, VirB9, and VirB10 Interact with One Another