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Volume 150, Issue 3

Molecular analysis of the channel-forming protein P13 and its paralogue family 48 from different Lyme disease species Free

Abstract

The aetiological agent of Lyme disease, cycles between its tick vector and mammalian hosts, implying that it can sense different environments and consequently change the expression of genes encoding several surface-associated proteins. The genome of the type strain B31 has revealed 175 different gene families. The gene, situated on the chromosome, encodes a channel-forming protein that belongs to the gene family 48 consisting of eight additional paralogous genes. The heterogeneity of the P13 protein from different Lyme disease strains was investigated. The predicted surface-exposed domains are the most heterogeneous regions and contain probable epitopes of P13. The membrane-spanning architecture of P13 was determined and a model for the location of this protein in the outer membrane is presented. The transcription of the paralogues of gene family 48 during culturing and in a mouse infection model was also analysed. The gene is the only paralogue present in all three Lyme-disease-causing genospecies; it is stable during cultivation and the BBA01 protein was expressed in all strains investigated. Conversely, paralogues , and were only detected in and the corresponding plasmids harbouring and were lost during passage. Finally, and are the only members of gene family 48 that are transcribed in mice, suggesting their importance during mammalian infection.

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2004-03-01
2024-04-23
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Molecular analysis of the channel-forming protein P13 and its paralogue family 48 from different Lyme disease Borrelia species
Microbiology 150, 549 (2004); https://doi.org/10.1099/mic.0.26728-0
/content/journal/micro/10.1099/mic.0.26728-0
/content/journal/micro/10.1099/mic.0.26728-0
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