East-Asian Helicobacter pylori strains synthesize heptan-deficient lipopolysaccharide
Fig 4
Bioinformatic analysis of the glycosyltransferase genes in H. pylori LPS biosynthetic pathway.
The pattern of the presence/absence of the assigned LPS glycosyltransferase genes in 65 strains with well-assembled LPS genes. Based on the polymorphism of the carboxy-terminal half of the enzyme, 5 HP1105 alleles are distinguished. The locus JHP0562-0563 contains one or two glycosyltransferase genes among the three possible ones (1 to 3) with the amino-terminal modules (n1 to n3) and the carboxy-terminal counterparts (c1 to c3). The glycosyltransferases responsible for synthesis of core-Trio-Glc and distal Lewis antigens are conserved amongst H. pylori strains; the glycosyltransferases responsible for synthesis of the intervening region between the core-Trio-Glc and the distal Lewis antigens vary substantially among H. pylori populations: both HP1283 and HP1578 are absent in all studied hspEastAsia strains exhibiting JHP0562 (n1c1) and two copies of HP1105 alleles (highlighted in green box). In contrast, strains harbouring the HP1283/HP1578 usually contain only one copy of HP1105 (mostly allele 1) and lack JHP0562 (n1c1) (highlighted in black box).