Abstract
Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a Gram-negative opportunistic bacterial pathogen that can cause chronic infection of the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients. Chaperone-usher systems in P. aeruginosa are known to translocate and assemble adhesive pili on the bacterial surface and contribute to biofilm formation within the host. Here, we report the crystal structure of the tip adhesion subunit CupB6 from the cupB1–6 gene cluster. The tip domain is connected to the pilus via the N-terminal donor strand from the main pilus subunit CupB1. Although the CupB6 adhesion domain bears structural features similar to other CU adhesins it displays an unusual polyproline helix adjacent to a prominent surface pocket, which are likely the site for receptor recognition.
Highlights
Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a Gram-negative opportunistic bacterial pathogen that can cause chronic infection of the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients
The first fimbrial component to be presented to the pore for secretion is the tip subunit and these often comprise an N-terminal adhesion domain directly coupled to a canonical pilus immunoglobulin (Ig) domain
The donor strand complemented product referred to here as CupB6dscB1 was cloned into a pET28b vector encoding a C-terminal His6 tag
Summary
Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a Gram-negative opportunistic bacterial pathogen that can cause chronic infection of the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients. It can persist in tissues in the form of specialized bacterial communities, known as a biofilm, which are formed through interactions between surface component on bacterial cells and to surfaces. By screening a mutant library of P. aeruginosa strains, a series of genes were identified to be important in early stages of biofilm formation Several clusters of these genes showed sequence similarity with the chaperone/usher (CU) pathway [2,3], which is conserved in Gram negative bacteria and involved in the assembly of extracellular fimbriae. Rasheed et al / Biochimica et Biophysica Acta 1864 (2016) 1500–1505 pocket, which is likely to represent the binding side for its cognate receptor
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
