The periodontopathogenic bacterium Eikenella corrodens produces an autoinducer-2-inactivating enzyme.

Eikenella corrodens produces autoinducer-2 (AI-2) in the mid log phase, and AI-2 activity decreases dramatically during the stationary phase. We investigated the mechanism underlying this decrease in AI-2 activity. To analyze the mechanism, we extracted and purified AI-2 from the supernatant of mid-log-phase culture. Simultaneously, the stationary-phase culture supernatant was fractionated by ammonium sulfate precipitation. On incubating purified AI-2 and 4-hydroxy-5-methyl-3(2H)-furanone (MHF) with each fraction, the 30% fraction decreased both AI-2 and MHF activities. The data suggest that AI-2 and MHF were rendered inactive in the same manner. Heat and/or trypsin treatment of the 30% fraction did not completely arrest AI-2 inactivation, suggesting that partially heat-stable proteins are involved in AI-2 inactivation. We observed that an enzyme converted MHF to another form. This suggests that E. corrodens produces an AI-2 inactivating enzyme, and that AI-2 can be degraded or modified by it.

Citation

Mohammad Minnatul Karim, Ayako Nagao, Fariha Jasin Mansur, Tetsuro Matsunaga, Yoshihiko Akakabe, Yuichiro Noiri, Shigeyuki Ebisu, Akio Kato, Hiroyuki Azakami. The periodontopathogenic bacterium Eikenella corrodens produces an autoinducer-2-inactivating enzyme. Bioscience, biotechnology, and biochemistry. 2013 May 23;77(5):1080-5

PMID: 23649272

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