CHARACTERIZATION OF A PORPHYROMONAS-GINGIVALIS GENE PRTR THAT ENCODESAN ARGININE-SPECIFIC THIOL PROTEINASE AND MULTIPLE ADHESINS

Cysteine proteinases of Porphyromonas gingivalis have been implicated as major virulence factors in the development of periodontitis. Severa l groups have reported the characterisation of similar genes encoding the same arginine-specific thiol proteinase from P. gingivalis; howeve r, the reported size and structure of the genes have varied. We report here the complete nucleotide sequence of the gene prtR that encodes a polyprotein containing the Arg-specific proteinase and multiple haema gglutinins/adhesins. The nascent polyprotein consists of a putative le ader sequence and a prosequence followed by the 45 kDa Arg-specific pr oteinase and 44, 15, 17 and 27 kDa sequence-related adhesins in that o rder. The size and structure of the prtR are consistent with the size of the mRNA transcript (5.3 kb) and the size and sequences of the indi vidual protein components purified from P. gingivalis. (C) 1996 Academ ic Press, Inc.