Abstract
Structural modification of peptidoglycan (PG) is one of the mechanisms that pathogenic bacteria use to evade the host innate immune system. For the noninvasive human gastric pathogen Helicobacter pylori, PG delivery to the host cells is one trigger of the immune response. H. pylori HP310 was markedly up-expressed upon cell exposure to oxidative stress. However, disruption of HP310 did not produce a phenotype distinguishable from the parent, including oxidative stress resistance characteristics. HP310 shows very weak homology to a known gene pgdA encoding PG deacetylase in Streptococcous pneumoniae. PGs from wild type H. pylori and the HP310 mutant were purified and analyzed by matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight and high pressure liquid chromatography. The parent strain PG is partially deacetylated, whereas several major PG-deacetylated muropeptides are absent or significantly reduced in the HP310 mutant. PG deacetylase activity was directly demonstrated by use of pure PG and HP310 protein by measuring the release of acetic acid. The Gram-negative bacterium H. pylori is highly resistant to lysozyme (up to 50 mg/ml), but the HP310 mutant is less resistant to lysozyme compared with the parent strain. Complementation of an hp310 strain with the wild type gene restored lysozyme resistance. The purified PG from the mutant is more susceptible to lysozyme (0.3 mg/ml) digestion than the wild type PG. The PG deacetylation appears to confer lysozyme resistance to escape immune detection. HP310 is representative of a new subfamily of bacterial PG deacetylases.