Bacterial exopolysaccharides: biosynthesis pathways and engineering strategies

A b s t r a c tProbiotics promote and help to maintain beneficial microbiota composition of the gastrointestinal tract ecosystem and have a positive impact on the host's health. Production of exopolysaccharides is an important feature of probiotic lactobacilli. It increases the chance of their survival in the gastrointestinal tract and promotes adhesion to the epithelium; therefore, exopolysaccharides are important for the process of colonization. Two lactic acid bacteria strains were used in this study: Lactobacillus rhamnosus KL 53A and Lactobacillus casei Fyos. Exopolysaccharides were isolated from bacterial cells and their monosaccharide composition was examined using liquid chromatography. The influence of exopolysaccharides on lactobacilli adhesion to enterocytes was studied after deglycosylation of the bacterial cells and incubation with the selected intestinal microbiota strains that metabolize polysaccharides -Faecalibacterium prausnitzii DSM 17677 and Blautia luti DSM 14534. Both deglycosylation and incubation with polysaccharide metabolizing strains influenced the ability of probiotic strains to adhere to enterocytes. Enzymatic deglycosylation decreased adhesion efficiency of L. rhamnosus KL 53A; however, co-incubation of both lactobacillus strains with F. prausnitzii DSM 17677 resulted in an increase of their adhesion efficiency. Exopolysaccharides are important adhesins of Lactobacillus spp. that influence their ability to colonize gut epithelium. Other members of gut microbiota can modify the adhesion property in situ; therefore the composition and metabolic state of commensal bacteria may influence their probiotic action.K e y w o r d s: bacteria, adhesion, deglycosylation, polysaccharides, Caco-2 cells Konieczna C. et al.

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“…In some cases (e.g. dextran, levan) the synthesis of EPS can be entirely extracellular (Schmid et al 2015).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The Wzx flippase translocates the repeated units into the periplasm, where polymerization by the Wzy polymerase takes place. In the last stage, polysaccharide is transported outside the cell by the OPX protein (Schmid et al 2015).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Exopolysaccharides Produced by Lactobacillus rhamnosus KL 53A and Lactobacillus casei Fyos Affect Their Adhesion to Enterocytes

Konieczna

Słodziński

Schmidt

2018

Polish Journal of Microbiology

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“…While the above two systems are responsible for secreting linear polysaccharides across the inner membrane, the Wzx/Wzy-dependent mechanism is often used to secrete branched polysaccharides (Schmid et al, 2015). In this system, the repeating unit of the heterologous polysaccharide (i.e.…”

Section: Wzx/wzy Mechanismmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…10) (Whitney and Howell, 2013;Schmid et al, 2015). Here, the entire polysaccharide is synthesized on a lipidlinked precursor by membrane associated GTs.…”

Section: Abc Transporter Mediatedmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Structural Studies of Biopolymer Membrane Transport

Morgan¹

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The selective transport of specific substrates across the membrane is an essential part of biology.Organisms have evolved a basic mechanism for the transport of ions and small molecule such as sugars across the membrane. This mechanism is termed 'alternating access' and involves the alternating exposure of a substrate-binding site to either side of the membrane. While the molecular details of 'alternating access' have been revealed for a number of different transporters, this scheme seems infeasible for the transport of long biopolymers such as nucleic acids, proteins, and polysaccharides because 'alternating access' requires that the transporter forms a binding site that is large enough to bind the entire substrate. Here, I present novel data addressing the transport mechanism for two bacterial biopolymer transporter proteins: Bacterial Cellulose Synthase which synthesizes and secretes the polysaccharide, cellulose; and PrtD, an ABC transporter which is involved in the secretion of an extracellular protease.Cellulose is a linear polymer of glucose units that forms a major component of plant cell walls as well as many bacterial biofilms. In bacteria, the components required for cellulose biosynthesis are encoded in a single operon minimally made up of the genes bcsA, bcsB, bcsC, and bcsZ. BcsA is an integral inner-membrane (IM) glycosyltransferase enzyme that is responsible for coupling the synthesis of cellulose with its transport across the IM. BcsB is a periplasmic protein with Cterminal IM anchor, and BcsB forms a complex with BcsA (BcsA-B) that is sufficient for in vitro cellulose synthesis. BcsZ is a periplasmic cellulase enzyme, and BcsC is an outer-membrane β-barrel that presumably forms a pore for the cellulose polymer to cross the outer membrane.iii BcsA-B activity is stimulated by the bacterial signaling molecule, cyclic-di-GMP (c-di-GMP), which is a key regulator of biofilm formation. I present crystal structures of the c-di-GMP-bound BcsA-B complex in the presence and absence of UDP, a competitive inhibitor and substrate mimic. The structures reveal that c-di-GMP releases an auto-inhibited state of the enzyme. A salt bridge stabilizes one of the signature c-di-GMP-binding Arg residues in a position to tether a conserved 'gating loop' in front of the active site. The binding of c-di-GMP releases the tether and allows substrate to access the active site. Additionally, the UDP-bound structure reveals an additional role for the 'gating loop' in coordinating substrate at the active site. Functional experiments confirm the structural interpretation by revealing that disruption of the auto-inhibitory salt bridge by mutagenesis generates a constitutively-active cellulose synthase. The mechanistic insights presented here represent the first examples of how c-di-GMP allosterically modulates enzymatic functions.To address the mechanism by which BcsA-B transports cellulose across the IM, I use in crystallo enzymology with the c-di-GMP-bound BcsA-B crystals. Because crystallized BcsA-B is catalytically a...

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