Abstract
Staphylococcus aureus is a commensal bacterium that has the ability to cause superficial and deep-seated infections. Like several other invasive pathogens, S. aureus can capture plasminogen from the human host where it can be converted to plasmin by host plasminogen activators or by endogenously expressed staphylokinase. This study demonstrates that sortase-anchored cell wall-associated proteins are responsible for capturing the bulk of bound plasminogen. Two cell wall-associated proteins, the fibrinogen- and fibronectin-binding proteins A and B, were found to bind plasminogen, and one of them, FnBPB, was studied in detail. Plasminogen captured on the surface of S. aureus- or Lactococcus lactis-expressing FnBPB could be activated to the potent serine protease plasmin by staphylokinase and tissue plasminogen activator. Plasminogen bound to recombinant FnBPB with a KD of 0.532 μm as determined by surface plasmon resonance. Plasminogen binding did not to occur by the same mechanism through which FnBPB binds to fibrinogen. Indeed, FnBPB could bind both ligands simultaneously indicating that their binding sites do not overlap. The N3 subdomain of FnBPB contains the full plasminogen-binding site, and this includes, at least in part, two conserved patches of surface-located lysine residues that were recognized by kringle 4 of the host protein.