Three Distinct Proteases Are Responsible for Overall Cell Surface Proteolysis in Streptococcus thermophilus - INRAE - Institut national de recherche pour l’agriculture, l’alimentation et l’environnement Access content directly
Journal Articles Applied and Environmental Microbiology Year : 2021

Three Distinct Proteases Are Responsible for Overall Cell Surface Proteolysis in Streptococcus thermophilus

Abstract

The lactic acid bacterium Streptococcus thermophilus was believed to display only two distinct proteases at the cell surface, namely, the cell envelope protease PrtS and the housekeeping protease HtrA. Using peptidomics, we demonstrate here the existence of an additional active cell surface protease, which shares significant homology with the SepM protease of Streptococcus mutans. Although all three proteases—PrtS, HtrA, and SepM—are involved in the turnover of surface proteins, they demonstrate distinct substrate specificities. In particular, SepM cleaves proteins involved in cell wall metabolism and cell elongation, and its inactivation has consequences for cell morphology. When all three proteases are inactivated, the residual cell-surface proteolysis of S. thermophilus is approximately 5% of that of the wildtype strain. IMPORTANCE Streptococcus thermophilus is a lactic acid bacterium used widely as a starter in the dairy industry. Due to its “generally recognized as safe” status and its weak cell surface proteolytic activity, it is also considered a potential bacterial vector for heterologous protein production. Our identification of a new cell surface protease made it possible to construct a mutant strain with a 95% reduction in surface proteolysis, which could be useful in numerous biotechnological applications

Dates and versions

hal-03512789 , version 1 (05-01-2022)

Identifiers

Cite

Mylène Boulay, Coralie Metton, Christine Mézange, Lydie Oliveira Correia, Thierry Meylheuc, et al.. Three Distinct Proteases Are Responsible for Overall Cell Surface Proteolysis in Streptococcus thermophilus. Applied and Environmental Microbiology, 2021, 87 (23), ⟨10.1128/AEM.01292-21⟩. ⟨hal-03512789⟩
53 View
0 Download

Altmetric

Share

Gmail Facebook X LinkedIn More