The Rap and Hor proteins of Erwinia, Serratia and Yersinia: a novel subgroup in a growing superfamily of proteins regulating diverse physiological processes in bacterial pathogens |
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| Authors: | N R Thomson A Cox B W Bycroft G S A B Stewart P Williams & G P C Salmond |
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| Institution: | Department of Biochemistry, University of Cambridge, Tennis Court Road, Cambridge CB2 1QW, UK.,;Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Nottingham, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK.,;Department of Applied Biochemistry and Food Science, University of Nottingham, Faculty of Agriculture and Food Sciences, Sutton Bonington Campus, LE12 5RD, UK. |
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| Abstract: | The enteric bacterium Serratia marcescens is an opportunistic human pathogen. The strain ATCC39006 makes the red pigment, prodigiosin (Pig), and the β-lactam antibiotic carbapenem (Car). Mutants were isolated that were concomitantly defective for Pig and Car production. These mutants were found to have a mutation in the rap gene (regulation of antibiotic and pigment). Sequence analysis of the rap gene revealed a predicted protein product showing strong homology to SlyA, originally thought to be a haemolytic virulence determinant in Salmonella typhimurium. Homologues of rap were detected in several bacterial genera, including Salmonella, Yersinia, Enterobacter , and species of the plant pathogen, Erwinia. The Erwinia horEr (homologue of rap ) and the Yersinia horYe genes were also found to be very similar to rap and slyA. Marker exchange mutagenesis of horEr revealed that it encoded a regulatory protein controlling the production of antibiotic and exoenzyme virulence determinants in the phytopathogen, Erwinia carotovora subspecies carotovora. We have shown that these new homologues of SlyA form a highly conserved subgroup of a growing superfamily of bacterial regulatory proteins controlling diverse physiological processes in human, animal and plant pathogens. |
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