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The involvement of sortase A in high virulence of STSS-causing Streptococcus suis serotype 2

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Abstract

Sortase A (SrtA), originally identified as a transpeptidase in Staphylococcus aureus, plays key roles in full virulence of pathogenic bacteria. In silico genome-wide search suggested a srtA homologue from 05ZYH33, a Chinese human isolate of streptococcal toxic shock syndrome (STSS)-causing Streptococcus suis serotype 2 (S. suis 2, SS2). An isogenic srtA mutant (ΔsrtA) of 05ZYH33 strain was obtained by homologous recombination. Immunofluorescence analysis revealed that two known virulence-associated surface proteins featuring Leu-Pro-X-Thr-Gly motif, muramidase-released protein and surface antigen one, were absent in the ΔsrtA. Piglet infection experiments showed that deletion of srtA attenuated the full virulence of 05ZYH33 strain, and impaired its colonizing potential in specific organs. Furthermore, the ΔsrtA displayed significant reduction in adherence to human cells (Hep-2 and human umbilical vein endothelial cells). Collectively, we concluded that SrtA was involved in the virulence manifestation of STSS-causing SS2.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Dr Fatemah Hermes at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) for critical reading the manuscript. We are grateful to Prof. Daisuke Takamatsu at National Institute of Animal Health of Japan for the generous gifts of the E. coli–S. suis shuttle vectors. We gratefully acknowledge the technical assistance of Dr Xinqiao Wang, statistical analysis and manuscript review by Dr Zhaohong Chen. The work was supported by National High-Tech Research & Development Project 863 (2006AA0Z455), National Natural Science Foundation of China (30600533, 30730081&30670105), and Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province, China (BK2006014&BK2007013).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pathogen Biology, Jiangsu Province Key Laboratory of Modern Pathogen Biology, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, China

    Changjun Wang & Jiaqi Tang

  2. Department of Epidemiology, Research Institute for Medicine of Nanjing Command, Nanjing, China

    Changjun Wang, Ming Li, Feng Zheng, Yaqing Dong, Xiuzhen Pan, Gong Cheng, Ruiping Dong, Dan Hu, Xiaodan Feng, Junchao Ge, Jing Wang, Min Cao & Jiaqi Tang

  3. Department of Microbiology, Third Military Medical University, Chongqing, China

    Ming Li & Fuquan Hu

  4. Center for Molecular Immunology, Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Science, Beijing, China

    Youjun Feng & Di Liu

  5. Graduate University, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Youjun Feng

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  1. Changjun Wang
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Correspondence to Jiaqi Tang.

Additional information

Communicated by Sebastian Suerbaum.

Jiaqi Tang, Changjun Wang designed the study; Changjun Wang, Feng Zheng, Ming Li, Youjun Feng, Yaqing Dong, Gong Cheng, Jing Wang, Dan Hu, Xiaodan Feng, Fuquan Hu, and Junchao Ge performed the experiments; Changjun Wang, Ming Li, Youjun Feng, Feng Zheng, Yaqing Dong, Gong Cheng, Xiuzhen Pan, Di Liu, and Min Cao analyzed the data; Changjun Wang, Jiaqi Tang, Youjun Feng, and Ming Li wrote the paper.

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Wang, C., Li, M., Feng, Y. et al. The involvement of sortase A in high virulence of STSS-causing Streptococcus suis serotype 2. Arch Microbiol 191, 23–33 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00203-008-0425-z

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