Cellular association of glucosyltransferases in Leuconostoc mesenteroides and effects of detergent on cell association.

Most glucosyltransferase (GTF) activity in sucrose-grown cultures of some strains of Leuconostoc mesenteroides is found with the cell pellet after centrifugation. GTFs are known to bind to dextrans, and it was traditionally assumed that cell-associated GTFs were bound to those dextrans that cosedimented with the cells. We used a mutant strain (LC-17), derived from strain NRRL B-1355, which produced dextransucrase in the absence of dextrans, to investigate the extent to which GTFs were bound to cells or dextrans. Much of the GTF activity in glucose-grown cultures of strain LC-17, which do not produce dextran, was located in the cell pellets. Soluble enzyme activity increased when cell suspensions from glucose- or sucrose-grown cultures were incubated with mild nonionic detergents or zwitterionic reagents. Alternansucrase produced by the parent strain B-1355 was almost entirely associated with cells under conditions in which dextrans were or were not produced. Alternansucrase, but not dextransucrase, tended to be enriched in the particulate fraction of B-1355 cells that had been broken in a French press. The distribution of alternansucrase and the effects of detergents on the distribution of GTFs suggest that soluble GTFs sequestered in the cytoplasm, and GTFs bound or adsorbed to the cell membrane are probably the major contributors to the cell-associated GTF activity.