Bordetella pertussis is the causative agent of whooping cough, a sever
e disease of infants characterised by repeated bouts of paroxysmal cou
ghing. Pertussis toxin (PT) is a major virulence factor of B. pertussi
s and is a typical A/B bacterial toxin consisting of five subunits S1-
S5 in a ratio of 1:1:1:2:1. The PT subunit genes are organized into an
operon which is not expressed in Escherichia coli, thus hampering the
use of this organism for vaccine production. We have expressed the Ji
ve PT subunits individually, in E. coli by replacing the wild-type tra
nscriptional and translational signals, and in the case of the S4 subu
nit the leader peptide has been exchanged with a modified E. coli beta
-lactamase lender sequence. We have developed a stepwise cloning metho
d to construct a synthetic PT operon which simultaneously expresses th
e Jive PT subunits in E. coli. Western blot analysis indicated that in
E. coli KS476 containing the synthetic PT operon, S4 and S5 were comp
letely processed, SI was partially processed whilst the majority of S2
and S3 remained unprocessed. Periplasmic extracts contained soluble S
I and S3; however, the processed form of S2, S4 and S5 were not detect
ed suggesting that these subunits may be membrane associated or in an
insoluble form. This work should allow an investigation of the potenti
al of E. coli to produce detoxified PT in a background free of other p
ertussis virulence factors that may contribute to the side-effects of
some vaccine preparations currently in use. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science
Ltd.