title: Identification of an O-antigen chain length regulator, WzzP, in Porphyromonas gingivalis.
abstract: The periodontal pathogen Porphyromonas gingivalis has two different lipopolysaccharides (LPSs) designated O-LPS and A-LPS, which are a conventional O-antigen polysaccharide and an anionic polysaccharide that are both linked to lipid A-cores, respectively. However, the precise mechanisms of LPS biosynthesis remain to be determined. In this study, we isolated a pigment-less mutant by transposon mutagenesis and identified that the transposon was inserted into the coding sequence PGN_2005, which encodes a hypothetical protein of P. gingivalis ATCC 33277. We found that (i) LPSs purified from the PGN_2005 mutant were shorter than those of the wild type; (ii) the PGN_2005 protein was located in the inner membrane fraction; and (iii) the PGN_2005 gene conferred Wzz activity upon an Escherichia coli wzz mutant. These results indicate that the PGN_2005 protein, which was designated WzzP, is a functional homolog of the Wzz protein in P. gingivalis. Comparison of amino acid sequences among WzzP and conventional Wzz proteins indicated that WzzP had an additional fragment at the C-terminal region. In addition, we determined that the PGN_1896 and PGN_1233 proteins and the PGN_1033 protein appear to be WbaP homolog proteins and a Wzx homolog protein involved in LPS biosynthesis, respectively.
authors.affiliation: Division of Microbiology and Oral Infection, Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, Nagasaki University Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, Nagasaki, 852-8588, Japan.
authors.forename: Mikio
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Shoji
authors.forename: Hideharu
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yukitake
authors.forename: Keiko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Sato
authors.forename: Yasuko
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Shibata
authors.forename: Mariko
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Naito
authors.forename: Joseph
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Aduse-Opoku
authors.forename: Yoshimitsu
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Abiko
authors.forename: Michael A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Curtis
authors.forename: Koji
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Nakayama
mesh_terms: D001426:Bacterial Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D004926:Escherichia coli / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D005816:Genetic Complementation Test; D006801:Humans; D016254:Mutagenesis, Insertional; D019081:O Antigens / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D016966:Porphyromonas gingivalis / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
chemical_list: D001426:Bacterial Proteins; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D019081:O Antigens; C075969:rol protein, Bacteria