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J Bacteriol, July 1998, p. 3711-3714, Vol. 180, No. 14
0021-9193/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.

The Central, Surface-Exposed Region of the Flagellar Hook Protein FlgE of Campylobacter jejuni Shows Hypervariability among Strains

Edeltraud Lüneberg,^1,* Eduardo Glenn-Calvo,^2, Maike Hartmann,¹ Werner Bär,^2, and Matthias Frosch¹

Institut für Hygiene und Mikrobiologie, Universität Würzburg, Würzburg,¹ and Institut für Medizinische Mikrobiologie, Medizinische Hochschule Hannover, Hannover,² Germany

Received 29 December 1997/Accepted 7 May 1998

In a previous study, we observed that monoclonal antibodies raised against the hook protein FlgE of Campylobacter jejuni LIO 36, isolate 5226, bound exclusively to this strain. The aim of this study was to elucidate the molecular basis for these binding specificities. The hook protein-encoding gene flgE of C. jejuni was cloned in Escherichia coli and sequenced. The flgE genes of four additional C. jejuni strains were amplified by PCR and also sequenced. Comparison of the deduced amino acid sequences revealed a high degree of variability in the central parts of the FlgE proteins among the strains, including variable and hypervariable domains. These findings may indicate a selective pressure of C. jejuni hosts, forcing the bacteria to generate variations in surface-exposed antigenic determinants.

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^* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Institut für Hygiene und Mikrobiologie, Universität Würzburg, Josef-Schneider-Str. 2, 97080 Würzburg, Germany. Phone: 49 (931) 201-3936. Fax: 49 (931) 201-3445. E-mail: elueneberg{at}hygiene.uni-wuerzburg.de.

Present address: University of Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica.

Present address: Carl-Thiem-Klinikum, Cottbus, Germany.

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J Bacteriol, July 1998, p. 3711-3714, Vol. 180, No. 14
0021-9193/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.

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