Heath D G, Cleary P P
Department of Microbiology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis 55455.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1989 Jun;86(12):4741-5. doi: 10.1073/pnas.86.12.4741.
The partial nucleotide sequence for an Fc-receptor gene from an M-type 76 group A streptococcus was determined. DNA sequence analysis revealed considerable sequence similarity between the Fc-receptor and M-protein genes in their proposed promoter regions, signal sequences, and 3' termini. Additional analysis indicated that the deduced Fc-receptor protein contains a proline-rich region and membrane anchor region highly similar to that of M protein. In view of these results, we postulated that Fc-receptor and M-protein genes of group A streptococci are the products of gene duplication from a common ancestral gene. It is proposed that DNA sequence similarity between these two genes may allow for extragenic homologous recombination as a means of generating antigenic diversity in these two surface proteins.
测定了一株M76型A群链球菌Fc受体基因的部分核苷酸序列。DNA序列分析显示,Fc受体基因和M蛋白基因在其推测的启动子区域、信号序列和3'末端具有相当大的序列相似性。进一步分析表明,推导的Fc受体蛋白含有一个富含脯氨酸的区域和一个与M蛋白高度相似的膜锚定区域。鉴于这些结果,我们推测A群链球菌的Fc受体基因和M蛋白基因是由一个共同祖先基因复制而来的产物。有人提出,这两个基因之间的DNA序列相似性可能允许基因外同源重组,作为这两种表面蛋白产生抗原多样性的一种方式。