Heterologous Expression of Pediocin/Papa in Bacillus Subtilis

Listeria moniocytogenes is food-borne pathogen. Pediocin is group II α bacteriocin with anti-listeria activity, naturally produced by Pediococuus acidilactic and Lactobacillus plantarum. Gene pepA/papA encode for pediocin. Expression and secretion of active papA was relayed on transporter papC and accessary protein papD on the same operon in native host. The excretion machines were also necessary for pediocin protein expression in heterologous host of E. coli, Lactobacillus lactis, and Corynebacterium glutamicum. In this study, two vector carrying codon sequence of papA mature peptide was constructed, with or without His tag. Both fragments were inserted into plasmid pHT43 and transformed Bacillus subtilis WB800N. The strains were induced with IPTG to secrete recombination protein PA1 and PA2 respectively. Supernatant from both recombination strains can inhibit Listeria monocytogenes ATCC54003 directly. The fused protein possesses inhibition activity as a whole, exempting from cleavage of leading peptide. Protein PA1 can be purified by nickel-nitrilotriacetic acid (Ni-NTA) metal affinity chromatography. This is the first report for active pediocin expression without assistance of papCD in heterogenous host.

Metabolic engineering of Bacillus subtilis with an Endopolygalacturonase gene Isolated from Pectobacterium carotovorum; a Plant Pathogenic bacterial strain.

Pectinolytic enzymes [pectinases] produced by microbes are highly important for their biotechnological use in processing of vegetables and fruits beverages and use in pulp and paper industry. A pectinases, namely endo-polygalacturonase [endo-PGase], encoding gene isolated from Pectobacterium carotovorum, a plant pathogenic strain of bacteria was successfully cloned into a secretion vector pHT43 having σ?-dependent promoter P grac . For enhanced expression analysis, competent cells of Bacillus subtilis (WB800N) were prepared at stationary phase using high salt medium. The recombinant B. subtilis competent cells, harboring the engineered pHT43 with the endo-PGase gene were cultured in 2X-yeast extract tryptone medium. The recombinant endo-PGase enzyme was secreted directly into the medium after 72 hours of the first IPTG induction. The recombinant endo-PGase was screened for its activity at various temperatures and pH ranges. Optimal activity was found at pH 5.0 and a temperature of 40°C with a stability ranging from pH 5.0-9.0. For detection of metal ion effect, recombinant enzyme was incubated with 1mM concentration of; Ca ++ , Mg ++ , Zn ++ , EDTA, K ++ for 45 minutes. Resultantly, Ca ++ , EDTA and Zn ++ strongly inhibited the enzyme activity. The chromatographic analysis of enzymatic hydrolysate of polygalacturonic acid [PGA] and pectin substrates using HPLC and TLC revealed that tri and tetra-galacturonates were the end products of hydrolysis. The study led to the conclusion that endo-PGase gene from the plant pathogenic strain was successfully expressed in Bacillus subtilis and assessed for enzyme production using a very simple medium with IPTG induction. These findings proposed that the Bacillus expression system might be safe for commercial enzyme production as compared to yeast and fungi to escape endotoxins.

Synergy between recombinant endoglucanase a and exoglucanase s secreted by bacillus subtilis WB800N

An approach for dertemining the synergistic activity of cellulosomal catalytic units in culture media is among essential steps in the research of artificial cellulosomes. Endoglucanase A (CelA) and exoglucanase S (CelS) are two abundant cellulosomal cellulases secreted by anaerobic thermophilic bacterium Clostridium thermocellum and mostly responsible for the cellulolytic activities. They are the well-known candidates of catalytic units for artificial mini-cellulosome. Their synergistic activities play important roles in cellulolytic degradation. CelA cleaves inside the cellulose chains and produces more chain ends for the next step controlling by CelS. While endoglucanase demonstrates distinct activity on carboxymethyl cellulose, it still lacks the specific substrate for quantifying exoglucanase activity. In this research, we introduced an approach for measuring the synergistic activity for these endo and exoglucanase. We designed two recombinant proteins CelA and CelS secreted by the host-cell Bacillus subtilis WB800N in order to investigate their synergistic activity in culture media. The secretory expression was confirmed by tandem mass spectrometry. A modified dinitrosalicylic acid assay was performed on 96 well-plate for quantifying cellulolytic activities of the secreted cellulases in culture media. When adding CelA into CelS, CMCase activities were enhanced and higher than the total of their individual CMCase activities at some cases. When mixing 3 of CelA with 5 of CelS, the CMCase activity was enhanced about 35.5% of the total activities from individual ones. This indicated the synergistic activity of the endo and exoglucanase could degrade cellulose more efficiently than their individual activities. The research also provides the essential materials and methods for further research on designing mini-cellulosome secreted by B. subtilis.

Using cellulose binding module of CBM3A as the purification tag for secreted Endoglucanase A (CelA) in Bacillus subtilis

Traditional methods of recombinant protein purification are uneconomic and inconvenient to the secreted proteins at large-volume. CBM3a, a module from cellulosome’s scaffoldin of Clostridium thermocellum, directs the binding of the cellulase complex on the cheap cellulose substrate. Most of previous studies about CBM3a fused with cellulases as the purification tag were conducted in intracellular Escherichia coli system. In this research, we used the extracellular Bacillus subtilis WB800N expression system to investigate the CBM3a-tag fused with endoglucanase CelA into plasmid pHT. The results indicated that protein CelA was secrected and purified by CBM3a-tag binding on the Regenerated Amorphous Cellulose (RAC) subtrate. This can be used for further improvement in protein purification tag designing.