methylation cycle and Bb

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Hey Rich,

Is this anything new?

- Kate

1: Int J Med Microbiol. 2006 May;296 Suppl 40:92-102. Epub 2006 Mar 10.

Functionality of Borrelia burgdorferi LuxS: the Lyme disease

spirochete produces and responds to the pheromone autoinducer-2 and

lacks a complete activated-methyl cycle.

* von Lackum K,

* Babb K,

* Riley SP,

* Wattier RL,

* Bykowski T,

* son B.

Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics,

College of Medicine, University of Kentucky, MS 415 Chandler Medical

Center, Lexington, Kentucky 40536-0298, USA.

Borrelia burgdorferi produces Pfs and LuxS enzymes for breakdown

of the toxic byproducts of methylation reactions, producing 4,5-

dihydroxy-2,3-pentanedione (DPD), adenine, and homocysteine. DPD and

its spontaneously rearranged derivatives constitute a class of

bacterial pheromones named autoinducer-2 (AI-2). We describe that B.

burgdorferi produces DPD during laboratory cultivation. Furthermore,

addition of in vitro synthesized DPD to cultured B. burgdorferi

resulted in altered expression levels of a specific set of bacterial

proteins, among which is the outer surface lipoprotein VlsE. While a

large number of bacteria utilize homocysteine, the other LuxS

product, for synthesis of methionine as part of the activated-methyl

cycle, B. burgdorferi was found to lack that ability. We propose that

the main function of B. burgdorferi LuxS is to synthesize DPD and

that the Lyme disease spirochete utilizes a form of DPD as a

pheromone to control gene expression.

PMID: 16530477 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]