Abstract
Shigella flexneri is the principal cause of bacillary dysentery, contributing significantly to the global burden of diarrheal disease. The appearance and increase in the multi-drug resistance among Shigella strains, necessitates further genetic studies and development of improved/new drugs against the pathogen. The presence of an abundance of hypothetical proteins in the genome and how little is known about them, make them interesting genetic targets. The present study aims to carry out characterization of the hypothetical proteins present in the genome of a newly emerged serotype of S. flexneri (strain Y394), toward their novel regulatory functions using various bioinformatics databases/tools. Analysis of the genome sequence rendered 4170 proteins, out of which 721 proteins were annotated as hypothetical proteins (HPs) with no known function. The amino acid sequences of these HPs were evaluated using a combination of latest bioinformatics tools based on homology search against functionally identified proteins. Functional domains were considered as the basis to infer the biological functions of HPs in this case and the annotation helped in assigning various classes to the proteins such as signal transducers, lipoproteins, enzymes, membrane proteins, transporters, virulence, and binding proteins. This study contributes to a better understanding of growth, survival, and disease mechanism at molecular level and provides potential new targets for designing drugs against Shigella infection.
Highlights
Shigella spp are causative agent of an extreme enteric infection known as shigellosis; they areGram-negative facultative anaerobes that belong to the family of Enterobacteriaceae and are closely related to Escherichia coli [1]
The entire workflow can be divided into five phases, involving sequence retrieval of the hypothetical proteins (HPs) from the genome; functional analysis by identifying conserved domains and their Gene ontology (GO) annotation; followed by analyzing their physiochemical characterization, subcellular localization and transmembrane helices; and lastly determining if they are involved in virulence of S. flexneri
S. flexneri 1c strain, which has previously been sequenced, an effort was made to annotate the function of these HPs, using an in silico approach
Summary
Shigella spp are causative agent of an extreme enteric infection known as shigellosis; they areGram-negative facultative anaerobes that belong to the family of Enterobacteriaceae and are closely related to Escherichia coli [1]. Shigella spp are causative agent of an extreme enteric infection known as shigellosis; they are. In 2015, Shigella was identified as the second most prominent cause for diarrheal deaths on a global scale [2]. Shigella is transmitted through the fecal-oral route or through ingestion of contaminated food and water [3]. Shigella spp. causes a self-limiting disease that can be effectively treated by oral rehydration or antibiotics, though it can be fatal in the very young and in infected individuals who are immunocompromised or do not have access to adequate medical treatment [4,5]. There is a steady rise in the number of shigellosis cases caused by antibiotic-resistant Shigella strains, which has become a growing concern
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