IMPORTANCE OF THE GALE GENE ON THE VIRULENCE OF PASTEURELLA-MULTOCIDA

The galE gene of Pasteurella multocida has been isolated by complement ing galE-defective mutants of Salmonella typhimurium with a plasmid li brary of this organism. The complete nucleotide sequence of the P. mul tocida galE gene consists of 1017 nucleotides, encoding a predicted po lypeptide of 339 amino acids. The deduced amino acid sequence displaye d the highest identity (85%) to the GalE protein of Haemophilus influe nzae. However, the gene organization surrounding the galE locus was di fferent from that of H. influenzae. A galE-defective mutant of P. mult ocida was obtained by replacement of the active galE gene by a copy in activated in vitro. The resulting galE mutant was highly attenuated as seen in a biological test carried out in a mouse model.