COMMENTARY Secretion Signal and Protein Targeting in Bacteria: a Biological Puzzle (original) (raw)

Secretion Signal and Protein Targeting in Bacteria: a Biological Puzzle

Journal of Bacteriology, 2010

Protein targeting in bacterial cells should be a rather simple process, since few subcellular compartments exist as compared to eukaryotic cells where targeting to the nucleus, mitochondria, peroxysomes, endoplasmic reticulum or chloroplasts is required. In most cases of bacterial protein targeting, the idea is that a tag is contained within the protein, and this label gives the cell information about where the protein should be delivered. This is reminiscent of the tagging of your luggage at the airport to have it delivered where appropriate. However, over the last few years, and especially in Gram negative bacteria, it has emerged that the protein targeting process involves much more diverse tags than expected and that the nature of some of them has still not been clearly elucidated. In this issue of Journal of Bacteriology, findings by the group of Cecile Wandersman highlight very well the complexity of this process (18). In essence, the targeting signal may sometimes be simple and universal, such as the classical N terminal signal peptide, which is used to

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