title: Adenylate cyclase toxin (CyaA) of Bordetella pertussis. Evidence for the formation of small ion-permeable channels and comparison with HlyA of Escherichia coli.
abstract: The interaction between the adenylate cyclase toxin (CyaA) of Bordetella pertussis and lipid was studied using the lipid bilayer assay. The addition of CyaA to the aqueous phase bathing lipid bilayer membranes composed of different lipids resulted in the increase of the membrane conductance. This increase was rather small for membranes formed of pure lipids as compared with lipid mixtures such as asolectin. The toxin formed in asolectin membranes small transient ion-permeable channels with a single-channel conductance of 27 pS in 1 M KCl, which is considerably smaller than that of the alpha-hemolysin (HlyA) of Escherichia coli (1500 pS). Experiments with different salts suggested that the CyaA-induced channels were exclusively cation-selective because of negative charges localized at the channel mouth. The single-channel conductance of channels initiated by CyaA was independent of whether the toxin was purified from B. pertussis or from recombinant E. coli. However, the channel-forming activity of the CyaA expressed in B. pertussis was substantially higher than that of the recombinant toxin. Experiments with mutant forms of CyaA suggested that both the activation of CyaA by CyaC and the hemeolytic part of the toxin, but not the repeats and the cyclase activity, are required for channel formation in lipid bilayer membranes.
authors.affiliation: Lehrstuhl fur Biotechnologie, Theodor-Boveri-Institut (Biozentrum), Universitat Wurzburg, Federal Republic of Germany.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Benz
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Maier
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Ladant
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ullmann
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sebo
mesh_terms: D037361:Adenylate Cyclase Toxin; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000737:chemistry*; D001886:Bordetella pertussis / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D004252:DNA Mutational Analysis; D004926:Escherichia coli; D029968:Escherichia coli Proteins; D006460:Hemolysin Proteins / Q000737:chemistry*; D007473:Ion Channels; D008051:Lipid Bilayers; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D013329:Structure-Activity Relationship; D010566:Virulence Factors, Bordetella / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D037361:Adenylate Cyclase Toxin; D001426:Bacterial Proteins; D029968:Escherichia coli Proteins; D006460:Hemolysin Proteins; C036507:Hlya protein, E coli; D007473:Ion Channels; D008051:Lipid Bilayers; D010566:Virulence Factors, Bordetella