Determination and Characterization of the Hemagglutinin-associated Short Motifs Found in Porphyromonas gingivalis Multiple Gene Products

• Published in: The Journal of biological chemistry 1999-02, Vol.274 (8), p.5012-5020
• Main Authors: Shibata, Y, Hayakawa, M, Takiguchi, H, Shiroza, T, Abiko, Y
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adhesins, Bacterial - chemistry; Adhesins, Bacterial - genetics; Adhesins, Bacterial - metabolism; Amino Acid Sequence; Base Sequence; Blotting, Southern; Chromosomes, Bacterial; Cloning, Molecular; Epitope Mapping; Hemagglutinins - metabolism; Molecular Sequence Data; Open Reading Frames; Porphyromonas gingivalis; Porphyromonas gingivalis - chemistry; Porphyromonas gingivalis - genetics; Porphyromonas gingivalis - metabolism; Restriction Mapping; Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
• ISSN: 0021-9258; 1083-351X
• DOI: 10.1074/jbc.274.8.5012

Porphyromonas gingivalis is a Gram-negative anaerobic bacterial species implicated as an important pathogen in the development of adult periodontitis. In our studies of P. gingivalis and ways to protect against periodontal disease, we have prepared the monoclonal antibody mAb-Pg-vc and its recombinant antibody, which are capable of inhibiting the hemagglutinating activity of P. gingivalis (Shibata, Y., Kurihara, K., Takiguchi, H., and Abiko, Y. (1998) Infect. Immun. 66, 2207–2212). To clarify the antigenically related hemagglutinating domains, we attempted to determine the minimum motifs responsible for P. gingivalis hemagglutinin. Initially, the 9-kilobase Eco RI fragment encoding the 130-kDa protein was cloned from the P. gingivalis chromosome using mAb-Pg-vc. Western blot analysis of nested deletion clones, the competition experiments using synthetic peptides, and the binding assay of the phage-displayed peptides using the mAb-Pg-vc allowed us to identify the minimum motifs, PVQNLT. Furthermore, the presence of multi-gene family coding for this epitope was confirmed via Southern blot analysis and PCR using the primers complementary to the domain corresponding to this epitope. It is suggested that the hemagglutinin-associated motif may be PVQNLT and that the gene families specifying this motif found in P. gingivalis chromosome encode many hemagglutinin and/or hemagglutinin-related proteases.