Previous Article | Next Article ![]()
Journal of Bacteriology, October 1999, p. 6033-6041, Vol. 181, No. 19
Department of Microbiology and Immunology,
West Virginia University Health Sciences Center, Morgantown, West
Virginia 26506
Received 21 May 1999/Accepted 28 July 1999
The HemA enzyme (glutamyl-tRNA reductase) catalyzes the first
committed step in heme biosynthesis in the enteric bacteria. HemA is
mainly regulated by conditional protein stability; it is stable and,
consequently, more abundant in heme-limited cells but unstable and less
abundant in normally growing cells. Both the Lon and ClpAP
energy-dependent proteases contribute to HemA turnover in vivo. Here we
report that the addition of two positively charged lysine residues to
the third and fourth positions at the HemA N terminus resulted in
complete stabilization of the protein. By contrast, the addition of an
N-terminal myc epitope tag did not affect turnover. This result
confirms the importance of the N-terminal sequence for proteolysis of
HemA. This region of the protein also contains a proline flanked by
hydrophobic residues, a motif that has been suggested to be important
for Lon-mediated proteolysis of UmuD. However, mutation of this motif
did not affect the turnover of HemA protein. Cells expressing the
stabilized HemA[KK] mutant protein display substantial defects in
heme regulation.
0021-9193/99/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1999, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
A Mutant HemA Protein with Positive Charge Close to
the N Terminus Is Stabilized against Heme-Regulated Proteolysis
in Salmonella typhimurium
*
Corresponding author. Mailing address: Department of
Microbiology and Immunology, P.O. Box 9177, WVU Health Sciences Center, Morgantown, WV 26506-9177. Phone: (304) 293-2676. Fax: (304) 293-7823. E-mail: telliott{at}wvu.edu.
This article has been cited by other articles:
Copyright © 2009 by the American Society for Microbiology. For an alternate route to Journals.ASM.org, visit: http://intl-journals.asm.org | More Info»