Identification of a gene, pilV, required for type 4 fimbrial biogenesis in Pseudomonas aeruginosa, whose product possesses a pre‐pilin‐like leader sequence
- 1 May 1995
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Wiley in Molecular Microbiology
- Vol. 16 (3), 485-496
- https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2958.1995.tb02413.x
Abstract
Type 4 fimbriae are important colonization factors in Pseudomonas aeruginosa and other pathogens that mediate attachment to epithelial cells of the host. They are also responsible for a form of translocation termed 'twitching motility' and are implicated in the susceptibility to fimbrial-specific bacteriophage. Analysis of a transposon mutant which lacks functional fimbriae has identified a new gene which is required for fimbrial biogenesis. This gene, termed pilV, is located on chromosomal SpeI fragment E, 2 kb downstream of the previously characterized pilSR genes involved in transcriptional activation of the fimbrial subunit gene. The pilV gene encodes a 20 kDa membrane-located protein with considerable amino-terminal homology to the type 4 consensus pre-pilin leader sequence, suggesting that it is processed by a leader peptidase. Site-directed mutagenesis has shown that PilV requires such cleavage to be functional. PilV also exhibits close similarity to a group of proteins involved in extracellular protein secretion from a number of Gram-negative bacteria, suggesting that the biogenesis of type 4 fimbriae may have a similar basis.Keywords
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