Disease relevance of ECs4660

• Screening of a library of pneumococcal mutants with defects in exported proteins revealed a putative two-component regulatory system, PnpR-PnpS, and a downstream ABC transporter, similar to the Pst system in E. coli including a gene encoding a PhoU protein [1].
• Thermally induced transcription of the phoU gene under control of the major leftward promoter, pL, of phage lambda resulted in production of the PhoU protein to compose approximately 5% of the total cell protein [2].

High impact information on ECs4660

• This operon encodes the PstSCAB transporter and PhoU protein that negatively regulate the phosphate (Pho) regulon [3].
• Nearly one-half of these PhoU-like proteins, including both PHOU_AQUAE and the one from E. coli, form a subfamily with an apparent dimer structure of two PhoU domains on the basis of their amino acid sequence [4].
• These data indicate that PhoU contributes to efficient colonization of the murine urinary tract and add PhoU to a short list of confirmed urovirulence factors [5].

Anatomical context of ECs4660

• PhoU enhances the ability of extraintestinal pathogenic Escherichia coli strain CFT073 to colonize the murine urinary tract [5].

References