RESEARCH ARTICLE MKAN27435 Is Required for the Biosynthesis of Higher Subclasses of Lipooligosaccharides inMycobacterium kansasii (original) (raw)

2016

Abstract

Lipooligosaccharides are glycolipids found in the cell wall of many mycobacterial species in-cluding the opportunistic pathogenMycobacterium kansasii. The genome ofM. kansasii ATCC12478 contains a cluster with genes orthologous toMycobacterium marinum LOS biosynthesis genes. To initiate a genetic dissection of this cluster and demonstrate its role in LOS biosynthesis inM. kansasii, we choseMKAN27435, a gene encoding a putative gly-cosyltransferase. Using Specialized Transduction, a phage-based gene knockout tool pre-viously used to generate null mutants in other mycobacteria, we generated aMKAN27435 null mutant. The mutant strain was found to be defective in the biosynthesis of higher LOS subspecies, viz LOS-IV, LOS-V, LOS-VI and LOS-VII. Additionally, a range of low abun-dance species were detected in the mutant strain and mass spectroscopic analysis indicat-ed that these were shunt products generated from LOS-III by the addition of up to six molecules of a pentose.

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