Schifferli D M, Beachey E H, Taylor R K
Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis.
J Bacteriol. 1991 Feb;173(3):1230-40. doi: 10.1128/jb.173.3.1230-1240.1991.
The 987P fimbrial gene cluster has recently been shown to contain eight genes (fasA to fasH) clustered on large plasmids of enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli and adjacent to a Tn1681-like transposon encoding the heat-stable enterotoxin STIa. Different genetic approaches were used to study the relationship between 987P fimbriation and adhesion. TnphoA mutagenesis, complementation assays, and T7 RNA polymerase-promoted gene expression indicated that all of the fas genes were involved in fimbrial expression and adhesion. In contrast to other fimbrial systems, the lack of expression of any single fas gene never resulted in the dissociation of fimbriation and adhesion, indicating that the adhesin is required for fimbrial expression and suggesting that FasA, the fimbrial structural subunit itself, is the adhesin. In addition, fimbrial length was shown to be modulated by the levels of expression of different fas genes.
最近研究表明，987P菌毛基因簇包含八个基因（fasA至fasH），这些基因聚集在产肠毒素大肠杆菌的大质粒上，并与编码热稳定肠毒素STIa的Tn1681样转座子相邻。采用了不同的遗传学方法来研究987P菌毛形成与黏附之间的关系。TnphoA诱变、互补分析和T7 RNA聚合酶促进的基因表达表明，所有fas基因都参与菌毛表达和黏附。与其他菌毛系统不同，任何单个fas基因表达缺失都不会导致菌毛形成和黏附的解离，这表明黏附素是菌毛表达所必需的，并且提示菌毛结构亚基FasA本身就是黏附素。此外，菌毛长度显示受不同fas基因表达水平的调节。
