Gerson TM, Ott AM, Karney MMA, Socea JN, Ginete DR, Iyer LM, Aravind L, Gary RK, Wing HJ. VirB, a key transcriptional regulator of
Shigella virulence, requires a CTP ligand for its regulatory activities.
mBio 2023;
14:e0151923. [PMID:
37728345 PMCID:
PMC10653881 DOI:
10.1128/mbio.01519-23]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/23/2023] [Accepted: 07/25/2023] [Indexed: 09/21/2023] Open
Abstract
IMPORTANCE
Shigella species cause bacillary dysentery, the second leading cause of diarrheal deaths worldwide. There is a pressing need to identify novel molecular drug targets. Shigella virulence phenotypes are controlled by the transcriptional regulator, VirB. We show that VirB belongs to a fast-evolving, plasmid-borne clade of the ParB superfamily, which has diverged from versions with a distinct cellular role-DNA partitioning. We report that, like classic members of the ParB family, VirB binds a highly unusual ligand, CTP. Mutants predicted to be defective in CTP binding are compromised in a variety of virulence attributes controlled by VirB, likely because these mutants cannot engage DNA. This study (i) reveals that VirB binds CTP, (ii) provides a link between VirB-CTP interactions and Shigella virulence phenotypes, (iii) provides new insight into VirB-CTP-DNA interactions, and (iv) broadens our understanding of the ParB superfamily, a group of bacterial proteins that play critical roles in many bacteria.
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