Brinkley Carl, Burland Valerie, Keller Rogéria, Rose Debra J, Boutin Adam T, Klink Sara A, Blattner Frederick R, Kaper James B
Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Center for Vaccine Development, University of Maryland School of Medicine, 685 West Baltimore St., Baltimore, MD 21201, USA.
Infect Immun. 2006 Sep;74(9):5408-13. doi: 10.1128/IAI.01840-05.
The complete nucleotide sequence was determined for pMAR7, an enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) adherence factor (EAF) plasmid that contains genes encoding a type IV attachment pilus (Bfp) and the global virulence regulator per. Prototypic EAF plasmid pMAR7 is self-transmissible, unlike the smaller EAF plasmid pB171, which has no genes encoding conjugative functions. The tra locus, a highly conserved 33-kb segment found in pMAR7, is similar to the tra (conjugation) region of the F plasmid. ISEc13 copies flanking the pMAR7 tra region could potentially mobilize or delete the tra genes. Hybridization of 134 EPEC strains showed that a complete tra region is present only in strains of the EPEC1 clonal group. This study confirms EPEC's potential for dissemination of virulence attributes by horizontal transfer of the EAF plasmid.
测定了pMAR7的完整核苷酸序列,pMAR7是一种肠致病性大肠杆菌(EPEC)黏附因子(EAF)质粒,它包含编码IV型黏附菌毛(Bfp)和全局毒力调节因子per的基因。与较小的EAF质粒pB171不同,原型EAF质粒pMAR7是自我传递的,pB171没有编码接合功能的基因。在pMAR7中发现的tra位点是一个高度保守的33kb片段,与F质粒的tra(接合)区域相似。位于pMAR7 tra区域两侧的ISEc13拷贝可能会激活或删除tra基因。对134株EPEC菌株的杂交分析表明,完整的tra区域仅存在于EPEC1克隆群的菌株中。这项研究证实了EPEC通过EAF质粒水平转移传播毒力属性的可能性。