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Infection and Immunity, October 2002, p. 5887-5892, Vol. 70, No. 10
0019-9567/02/$04.00+0 DOI: 10.1128/IAI.70.10.5887-5892.2002
Copyright © 2002, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Identification and Characterization of the N-Acetylglucosamine Glycosyltransferase Gene of Haemophilus ducreyi
Shuhua Sun,1,2 N. Karoline Scheffler,3 Bradford W. Gibson,3,4 Jing Wang,1 and Robert S. Munson Jr.1,2,5*
Columbus Children's Research Institute,1
Department of Pediatrics,5
Department of Molecular Virology, Immunology, and Medical Genetics, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 43205,2
Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, University of California, San Francisco, California 94143,3
Buck Institute for Age Research, Novato, California 949454
Received 12 April 2002/
Returned for modification 13 May 2002/
Accepted 3 July 2002

ABSTRACT
Haemophilus ducreyi is the causative agent of chancroid, a sexually
transmitted ulcerative disease. In the present study, the
Neisseria gonorrhoeae lgtA lipooligosaccharide glycosyltransferase gene
was used to identify a homologue in the genome of
H. ducreyi.
The putative
H. ducreyi glycosyltransferase gene (designated
lgtA) was cloned and insertionally inactivated, and an isogenic
mutant was constructed. Structural studies demonstrated that
the lipooligosaccharide isolated from the mutant strain lacked
N-acetylglucosamine and distal sugars found in the lipooligosaccharide
produced by the parental strain. The isogenic mutant was transformed
with a recombinant plasmid containing the putative glycosyltransferase
gene. This strain produced the lipooligosaccharide glycoforms
produced by the parental strain, confirming that the
lgtA gene
encodes the
N-acetylglucosamine glycosyltransferase.

TEXT
Haemophilus ducreyi is a fastidious gram-negative bacterium
that causes the sexually transmitted disease, chancroid. The
structure of the
H. ducreyi strain 35000HP lipooligosaccharide
(LOS) has been characterized in detail and is shown in Fig.
1. The nomenclature for the individual glycoforms and the branches
of the LOS chain has been determined (
4). The most complex glycoform
of the A-branch, designated A5, contains a nonreducing terminal
Galß1-4GlcNAc. Approximately 30% of the terminal galactose
residues in the A5 glycoform are substituted with sialic acid
to form the a-branch glycoform designated A5a1. Small quantities
of the A5 glycoform are substituted with GlcNAc to form the
b-branch glycoform designated A5b1 or with Galß1-4GlcNAc
to form the b-branch glycoform designated A5b2 (Fig.
1). The
sialyltransferase, both galactosyltransferases, the
D-glycero
-D-manno-heptose
heptosyltransferase, and the glucosyltransferase have previously
been identified and isogenic mutants constructed (
4,
7,
9,
21,
22). The only unidentified glycosyltransferase necessary for
synthesis of the A-branch of the LOS was the
N-acetylglucosamine
glycosyltransferase.
We report here the characterization of the LOS glycoforms produced
by an
lgtA mutant of
H. ducreyi, as well as the glycoforms produced
when the mutation is complemented. The results indicate that
the
lgtA gene in
H. ducreyi encodes the
N-acetylglucosamine
glycosyltransferase. In addition, the relative concentrations
of the complex b-branch glycoforms are increased in the complemented
strain, suggesting that the LgtA glycosyltransferase might also
be the
N-acetylglucosamine glycosyltransferase required for
synthesis of the b-branch glycoforms.
Bacterial strains and culture conditions.
H. ducreyi strains were grown at 35°C with 5% CO2 on chocolate agar (Becton Dickinson). Chocolate agar plates supplemented with streptomycin at 20 µg/ml, kanamycin at 20 µg/ml, and/or X-Gal (5-bromo-4-chloro-3-indolyl-ß-D-galactopyranoside) at 40 µg/ml were prepared as previously described (9, 17). Brain heart infusion broth supplemented with 5% fetal calf serum, 0.0025% hemin chloride solution (Sigma; predissolved in 20 mM NaOH), and 1% IsoVitaleX (sBHI) was used for growth of H. ducreyi in liquid medium. Escherichia coli strains were grown on Luria-Bertani (LB) plates or in LB broth supplemented with appropriate antibiotics. Kanamycin or streptomycin was used at 20 µg/ml and ampicillin was used at 50 µg/ml where appropriate. The bacterial strains and plasmids used in the present study are listed in Table 1.
Identification of the putative N-acetylglucosamine glycosyltransferase gene.
Both
Neisseria gonorrhoeae and
H. ducreyi infect human genital
epithelium and have similar LOS oligosaccharide structures that
include a Gal-GlcNAc (
N-acetyllactosamine) disaccharide. The
N-acetyllactosamine disaccharide is recognized by MAb 3F11.
The LgtB glycosyltransferase in
N. gonorrhoeae and its counterpart
in
H. ducreyi are responsible for transferring galactose to
the reducing terminal GlcNAc (
21). The
lgtA gene encoding the
N-acetylglucosamine glycosyltransferase is adjacent to the
lgtB gene in
N. gonorrhoeae. In contrast, the gene encoding the
H. ducreyi N-acetylglucosamine glycosyltransferase is not adjacent
to the
H. ducreyi lgtB gene. We searched the unfinished
H. ducreyi genome sequence with the tblastn program to identify genes with
homology to
N. gonorrhoeae LgtA. A previously unidentified putative
glycosyltransferase gene was identified and designated
lgtA.
The sequence surrounding the putative
N-acetylglucosamine glycosyltransferase
gene was further characterized. Upstream of
lgtA in
H. ducreyi is the homologue of the 6-phosphofructose kinase gene,
pfkA (Fig.
2). The first open reading frame downstream of
lgtA, designated
Hd0467, has homology with a hypothetical protein in
H. influenzae Rd, Hi1626. Downstream of Hd0467 is the
H. ducreyi pseudouridine
synthase, designated
rluD.
The predicted amino acid sequence of the
lgtA gene of
H. ducreyi is 42% identical to the derived amino acid sequences of the
lgtA homologues in
N. gonorrhoeae (
11) (GenBank accession number
U14554.1),
N. meningitidis (
14) (GenBank accession number
U25839.1),
and
N. subflava (
2) (GenBank accession number
AF240672.1). Based
on the analysis of mutant glycoforms and direct enzymatic assay,
the
N. meningitidis lgtA gene has been shown to encode a UDP-GlcNAc
transferase (
24). Based on the analysis of mutant glycoforms,
the LgtA glycosyltransferase from
N. gonorrhoeae is also thought
to be a UDP-GlcNAc transferase (
11). The
H. ducreyi LgtA glycosyltransferase
also has homology to the LgtD (UDP-GalNAc) glycosyltransferases
of
N. gonorrhoeae (
11) (GenBank accession number
U14554.1) and
H. influenzae HI1578 (
8,
13) (GenBank accession number
H64130),
as well as a putative glycosyltransferase of
Pasteurella multocida (
15) (GenBank accession number
NP_246077). The homology data
strongly suggest that the
H. ducreyi lgtA gene encodes a glycosyltransferase.
Cloning of the H. ducreyi lgtA gene and construction of an lgtA mutant.
The H. ducreyi lgtA gene was amplified by PCR using the FailSafe PCR preMix selection kit (Epicenter Technologies). The pair of oligonucleotide primers were targeted to a 1.9-kb DNA fragment containing the lgtA gene and the majority of the pfkA gene (Fig. 2). The two oligonucleotide primers were GlcNAc-F (5'-CTCGGAAATTATTAACCGTGGTGGTAC-3') and GlcNAc-R (5'-GAGCGGTTATTAATGTTAAATAACAGACGG-3').
The amplified 1.9-kb DNA product was cloned into PCRBlunt II-TOPO vector (Invitrogen, Carlsbad, La.). To lower the plasmid copy number, we transformed into the E. coli DH5
pcnB strain instead of the host strain supplied in the kit. One plasmid with an insert of the correct size was sequenced in both directions by using an ABI 377 DNA automated sequencer and dye terminator chemistries. Contig assembly and sequence analysis were performed with DNASTAR (Madison, Wis.) software. The insert had the correct sequence and the plasmid was designated pRSM2378.
An isogenic mutant was constructed in strain 35000HP by using the strategy of Bozue et al. (3). The insert in pRSM2378 has a unique BamHI site in the lgtA gene that was used to insertionally inactivate the gene (Fig. 2). First, the BamHI site from the suicide vector, pRSM 2072, was removed by digestion with BamHI, blunt ended with Klenow enzyme, religated, and transformed into DH5
. The modified plasmid was designated pRSM2377. The 1.9-kb EcoRI fragment from pRSM2378 was ligated to EcoRI and calf intestine alkaline phosphatase-treated pRSM2377 and then transformed into DH5
pcnB. The resulting plasmid was saved as pRSM2379. To inactivate the lgtA gene in the plasmid, pRSM2379 plasmid DNA was digested with BamHI and blunt ended with Klenow enzyme, and the purified linear plasmid DNA was ligated to the
Km2 element, which had been isolated as a SmaI fragment from pJRS102.0. The ligation mixture was transformed into DH5
pcnB, and clones were isolated on LB agar plates supplemented with kanamycin and ampicillin. A plasmid with the appropriate restriction map was saved as pRSM2380. To construct an isogenic lgtA mutant of H. ducreyi 35000HP, pRSM2380 DNA was electroporated into H. ducreyi 35000HP, and kanamycin-resistant clones were selected and then streaked for isolation on chocolate agar containing both kanamycin and X-Gal. Since the hydrolysis product of X-Gal is toxic to H. ducreyi, white clones that grew normally were presumptive mutants which had resolved the cointegrate and therefore were ß-galactosidase deficient. Southern blotting was performed on the genomic DNA from several presumptive mutants to verify the allele exchange as well as the loss of plasmid sequences. One mutant, designated 35000HP-RSM212, was saved for further analysis. Growth curves of the mutant and parent strain were similar and the outer membrane protein profiles of the lgtA mutant and the parent strain were indistinguishable (data not shown).
Analysis of the LOS from the isogenic lgtA mutant of H. ducreyi.
Crude LOS preparations from H. ducreyi wild-type 35000HP and mutant strains were prepared by a modified microphenol method (5), analyzed by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) on a 14% acrylamide gel, and silver stained as previously reported (5). The most complex glycoform produced by the H. ducreyi galactosyltransferase II (lgtB) mutant is the A4 glycoform (21) (Fig. 3A, lane 2; see Fig. 1 for corresponding structure), and the most complex glycoform produced by the galactosyltransferase I (lbgA) mutant is the A2 glycoform (22) (Fig. 3A, lane 4; see Fig. 1 for corresponding structure). The most complex LOS glycoform produced by strain 35000HP-RSM212, the lgtA mutant (Fig. 3A, lane 3), ran with a mobility between the LOS glycoforms produced by the mutants deficient in the LgtB and LgbA glycosyltransferases. This result demonstrates that the lgtA gene likely encodes the N-acetylglucosamine glycosyltransferase.
MS analysis of H. ducreyi LOS preparations from strain 35000HP and strain 35000HP-RSM212, the lgtA mutant.
LOS structures from
H. ducreyi strain 35000HP and the
N-acetylglucosamine
glycosyltransferase mutant strain 35000HP-RSM212 were analyzed
by mass spectrometry (MS). In each case, ca. 0.5 mg of LOS was
treated with mild hydrazine for 30 min at 37°C (
12) for
conversion into the corresponding water-soluble O-deacylated
LOS that is more amenable to MS analysis (
10). O-deacylated
samples were taken up in water and purified and/or desalted
by drop dialysis with a 0.025-mm (pore-size) nitrocellulose
membrane (Millipore, Bedford, Mass.). The dialyzed sample was
mixed in a 1:1 ratio with 320 mM 2,5-dihydroxybenzoic acid solution
in acetone, desalted with cation-exchange resin beads (Dowex
50X; NH
4+) (
16), and then air dried on a stainless steel target.
Samples were analyzed by matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization
MS (MALDI-MS) by using a PE Biosystems (Framingham, Mass.) Voyager
DE time-of-flight (TOF) mass spectrometer operated with a nitrogen
laser (337 nm) in the negative-ion mode under delayed extraction
conditions (
23). The delay time was 175 ns, and the grid voltage
was 93.5% of full acceleration voltage (20 to 30 kV). Spectra
were acquired and averaged, and the mass was calibrated with
an external calibrant consisting of an equimolar mixture of
angiotensin II, bradykinin, LHRH, bombesin,

-MSH (CZE mixture;
Bio-Rad) and ACTH 1-24 (Sigma). MALDI spectra of the O-deacylated
LOS preparations from the two strains are shown in Fig.
4. In
both spectra, one major singly deprotonated molecular ion peak
(at
m/z 2,957.4 and
m/z 2,592.4, respectively) corresponding
to the major intact LOS glycoforms was observed. A minor peak
observed at
m/z 3,248.9 in the preparation from the wild-type
strain corresponds to the sialic acid-containing glycoform (

=291
mu). The loss of a phosphoethanolamine (PEA) group was observed
for all glycoforms yielding peaks at 3,125.9,
m/z 2,834.0, and
m/z 2,306.5 in the case of the wild-type strain glycoforms and
m/z 2,469.1 in the case of the mutant strain glycoforms.
Under linear TOF conditions, the molecular ions for the individual
LOS species typically appear as unresolved isotopes whose centroids
correspond to the average mass. Two of the smaller peaks with
a lower mass than the intact LOS are due to "prompt fragmentation"
such as the loss of H
3PO
4 (
m/z 2,735.8 and
m/z 2,370.9). Further
fragmentation resulted in the peaks corresponding to the free
lipid A (
m/z 952.0), lipid A + PEA (
m/z 1,075.0), the free oligosaccharides
(
m/z 1,880.7,
m/z 1,719.1, and
m/z 1,515.2, respectively), as
well as peaks resulting from the instant loss of CO
2 from a
Kdo residue of the free OS (
m/z 1,836.5,
m/z 1,675.0, and
m/z 1,471.0, respectively). These data and the corresponding proposed
composition of the glycoforms are summarized in Table
2. The
most complex glycoform produced by the mutant lacks
N-acetylglucosamine,
the result anticipated if the
lgtA gene encodes the
N-acetylglucosamine
glycosyltransferase.
Complementation of the lgtA mutation in strain 35000HP-RSM212.
The
lgtA gene was cloned into the
EcoRI site of the shuttle
vector pLS88 and transformed into strain 35000HP-RSM212. Expression
of the LOS glycoforms produced by this strain were examined
by using silver-stained SDS-polyacrylamide gel and Western blot
analyses. Western blot analysis conditions with murine monoclonal
antibody (MAb) 3F11 were similar to the colony blot assay as
described previously (
9) with the following modification. Briefly,
samples separated on a polyacrylamide gel were transferred to
a nitrocellulose membrane filter by using a Bio-Rad Western
blot apparatus at 100 V for 2 h. Blots were then blocked in
2% gelatin (dissolved in buffer A [10 mM Tris-HCl, 1.5 M NaCl;
pH 7.4]) for 2 h and incubated overnight with 3F11 MAb diluted
1:1,000 in 1% gelatin. After being washed with buffer A, the
filter was incubated with a sheep anti-mouse immunoglobulin
G-alkaline phosphatase conjugate. Color development was carried
out in BCIP (5-bromo-4-chloro-3-indolylphosphate) and nitroblue
tetrazolium in AP buffer (100 mM Tris-HCl, 100 mM NaCl, 5 mM
MgCl
2; pH 9.5). It is known that
H. ducreyi can add either neuraminic
acid or a
N-acetyllactosamine to the terminal
N-acetyllactosamine
structure on the LOS core (Fig.
1), but the predominant LOS
glycoform produced by the wild-type strain is A5 (Fig.
3). Interestingly,
overexpression of the wild-type
lgtA gene on the multicopy plasmid
pLS88 dramatically changed the LOS expression pattern, as shown
in the silver-stained SDS-PAGE gel (Fig.
3B, left). The A5a1
and A5b1 glycoforms are more abundant than the A5 glycoform
in the LOS from the complemented mutant (compare lanes 1 and
3 in Fig.
3B [left]). Additionally, the quantity of the A3 glycoform
is decreased relative to that produced by the parental strain.
It is possible that the addition of GlcNAc residue in the LOS
core is the rate-limiting biosynthetic step and, as a consequence,
overexpression of the LgtA glycosyltransferase leads to a relative
increase in the abundance of the A5 glycoform, which is then
efficiently converted to more complex glycoforms. MAb 3F11 only
binds to terminal Galß1-4GlcNAc. The addition of a
distal sugar or neuraminic acid moiety blocks this reactivity.
As shown in Fig.
3B, right, neither the A5b1 nor A5a1 glycoforms
react with MAb 3F11, as shown by Western blot. The A5 and A5b2
glycoforms contain a terminal
N-acetyllactosamine disaccharide
that reacts with MAb 3F11. The reactivity of the A5b2 glycoform
is most readily visualized in the LOS from the complemented
strain that contains a higher concentration of the A5b2 glycoform
compared to LOS from the parental strain. It is interesting
that the A5b1 glycoform is also present at a high concentration
in this complemented strain compared to the parental strain.
Another unknown glycoform with a slower mobility than the A5b2
glycoform also exists in this strain. The abundance of this
glycoform is similar to that of the A5b2 glycoform. A glycoform
with this mobility exists in the wild-type strain as well, but
with a very low abundance.
The glycosyltransferase responsible for addition of GlcNAc to the A5 glycoform and the glycosyltransferase responsible for the addition of galactose to the A5b1 glycoform remain to be identified. However, in this biosynthetic pathway, GlcNAc is always added to an LOS glycoform containing a nonreducing terminal galactose, and the resulting GlcNAc-Gal linkage is always ß1-3. Therefore, it is reasonable to speculate that the addition of GlcNAc to both the A3 and the A5 glycoforms is catalyzed by the same N-acetylglucosamine glycosyltransferase, the lgtA gene product. Similarly, the addition of galactose to the A4 and A5b1 glycoforms may be catalyzed by the same galactosyltransferase (LgtB).
In summary, we have identified the glycosyltransferase responsible for addition of N-acetylglucosamine to the A-branch of H. ducreyi LOS. Expression of the lgtA gene on the plasmid pLS88 complements the mutation and also results in an increased concentration of the b-branch glycoforms containing additional GlcNAc or GalGlcNAc. This result suggests that LgtA may also be responsible for addition of GlcNAc to the A5 glycoform.
Nucleotide sequence accession number. The sequence for lgtA has been assigned GenBank accession number AF536817.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We thank Huachun Zhong for excellent technical assistance.
This work was supported by National Institutes of Health Grants R01 AI38444 (to R.S.M.) and R01 AI31254 (to B.W.G.) and by Applied Biosystems, Framingham, Mass., which kindly provided instrumentation to B.W.G. DNA sequence was determined by the Core Facility at Children's Research Institute that was supported in part by National Institutes of Health grant HD34615.

FOOTNOTES
* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Columbus Children's Research Institute, Rm. W402, 700 Children's Dr., Columbus, OH 43205. Phone: (614) 722-2680. Fax: (614) 722-3273. E-mail:
munsonr{at}pediatrics.ohio-state.edu.

Editor: B. B. Finlay

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Infection and Immunity, October 2002, p. 5887-5892, Vol. 70, No. 10
0019-9567/02/$04.00+0 DOI: 10.1128/IAI.70.10.5887-5892.2002
Copyright © 2002, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
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Vakevainen, M., Greenberg, S., Hansen, E. J.
(2003). Inhibition of Phagocytosis by Haemophilus ducreyi Requires Expression of the LspA1 and LspA2 Proteins. Infect. Immun.
71: 5994-6003
[Abstract]
[Full Text]