Departments of Genome Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America.
Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America.
PLoS Biol. 2018 Jan 17;16(1):e2004935. doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.2004935. eCollection 2018 Jan.
Gram-negative bacteria are surrounded by two membrane bilayers separated by a space termed the periplasm. The periplasm is a multipurpose compartment separate from the cytoplasm whose distinct reducing environment allows more efficient and diverse mechanisms of protein oxidation, folding, and quality control. The periplasm also contains structural elements and important environmental sensing modules, and it allows complex nanomachines to span the cell envelope. Recent work indicates that the size or intermembrane distance of the periplasm is controlled by periplasmic lipoproteins that anchor the outer membrane to the periplasmic peptidoglycan polymer. This periplasm intermembrane distance is critical for sensing outer membrane damage and dictates length of the flagellar periplasmic rotor, which controls motility. These exciting results resolve longstanding debates about whether the periplasmic distance has a biological function and raise the possibility that the mechanisms for maintenance of periplasmic size could be exploited for antibiotic development.
革兰氏阴性菌被两个双层膜包围，两个膜之间的空间被称为周质空间。周质空间是一个与细胞质分离的多用途隔室，其独特的还原环境允许更有效和多样化的蛋白质氧化、折叠和质量控制机制。周质空间还包含结构元素和重要的环境感应模块，并允许复杂的纳米机器跨越细胞包膜。最近的工作表明，周质空间的大小或膜间距离由周质脂蛋白控制，周质脂蛋白将外膜锚定到周质肽聚糖聚合物上。这种周质膜间距离对于感应外膜损伤至关重要，并决定了控制运动的鞭毛周质转子的长度。这些令人兴奋的结果解决了关于周质距离是否具有生物学功能的长期争论，并提出了维持周质大小的机制可能被用于抗生素开发的可能性。
