Cargando…

Brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system

BACKGROUND: Urease is a virulence factor that plays a role in the resistance of Brucella to low pH conditions, both in vivo and in vitro. Brucella contains two separate urease gene clusters, ure1 and ure2. Although only ure1 codes for an active urease, ure2 is also transcribed, but its contribution...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Sangari, Félix J, Cayón, Ana M, Seoane, Asunción, García-Lobo, Juan M
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2010
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2868824/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20380737
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2180-10-107
_version_ 1782181070074019840
author Sangari, Félix J
Cayón, Ana M
Seoane, Asunción
García-Lobo, Juan M
author_facet Sangari, Félix J
Cayón, Ana M
Seoane, Asunción
García-Lobo, Juan M
author_sort Sangari, Félix J
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Urease is a virulence factor that plays a role in the resistance of Brucella to low pH conditions, both in vivo and in vitro. Brucella contains two separate urease gene clusters, ure1 and ure2. Although only ure1 codes for an active urease, ure2 is also transcribed, but its contribution to Brucella biology is unknown. RESULTS: Re-examination of the ure2 locus showed that the operon includes five genes downstream of ureABCEFGDT that are orthologs to a nikKMLQO cluster encoding an ECF-type transport system for nickel. ureT and nikO mutants were constructed and analyzed for urease activity and acid resistance. A non-polar ureT mutant was unaffected in urease activity at neutral pH but showed a significantly decreased activity at acidic pH. It also showed a decreased survival rate to pH 2 at low concentration of urea when compared to the wild type. The nikO mutant had decreased urease activity and acid resistance at all urea concentrations tested, and this phenotype could be reverted by the addition of nickel to the growth medium. CONCLUSIONS: Based on these results, we concluded that the operon ure2 codes for an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transporter necessary for the maximal activity of the urease whose structural subunits are encoded exclusively by the genes in the ure1 operon.
format Text
id pubmed-2868824
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2010
publisher BioMed Central
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-28688242010-05-13 Brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system Sangari, Félix J Cayón, Ana M Seoane, Asunción García-Lobo, Juan M BMC Microbiol Research article BACKGROUND: Urease is a virulence factor that plays a role in the resistance of Brucella to low pH conditions, both in vivo and in vitro. Brucella contains two separate urease gene clusters, ure1 and ure2. Although only ure1 codes for an active urease, ure2 is also transcribed, but its contribution to Brucella biology is unknown. RESULTS: Re-examination of the ure2 locus showed that the operon includes five genes downstream of ureABCEFGDT that are orthologs to a nikKMLQO cluster encoding an ECF-type transport system for nickel. ureT and nikO mutants were constructed and analyzed for urease activity and acid resistance. A non-polar ureT mutant was unaffected in urease activity at neutral pH but showed a significantly decreased activity at acidic pH. It also showed a decreased survival rate to pH 2 at low concentration of urea when compared to the wild type. The nikO mutant had decreased urease activity and acid resistance at all urea concentrations tested, and this phenotype could be reverted by the addition of nickel to the growth medium. CONCLUSIONS: Based on these results, we concluded that the operon ure2 codes for an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transporter necessary for the maximal activity of the urease whose structural subunits are encoded exclusively by the genes in the ure1 operon. BioMed Central 2010-04-10 /pmc/articles/PMC2868824/ /pubmed/20380737 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2180-10-107 Text en Copyright ©2010 Sangari et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research article
Sangari, Félix J
Cayón, Ana M
Seoane, Asunción
García-Lobo, Juan M
Brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system
title Brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system
title_full Brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system
title_fullStr Brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system
title_full_unstemmed Brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system
title_short Brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system
title_sort brucella abortus ure2 region contains an acid-activated urea transporter and a nickel transport system
topic Research article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2868824/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20380737
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2180-10-107
work_keys_str_mv AT sangarifelixj brucellaabortusure2regioncontainsanacidactivatedureatransporterandanickeltransportsystem
AT cayonanam brucellaabortusure2regioncontainsanacidactivatedureatransporterandanickeltransportsystem
AT seoaneasuncion brucellaabortusure2regioncontainsanacidactivatedureatransporterandanickeltransportsystem
AT garcialobojuanm brucellaabortusure2regioncontainsanacidactivatedureatransporterandanickeltransportsystem