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. 1983 Aug;155(2):657–663. doi: 10.1128/jb.155.2.657-663.1983

The penicillinase of Bacillus licheniformis is an outer membrane protein in Escherichia coli.

M O Sarvas, I A Palva
PMCID: PMC217736  PMID: 6223920

Abstract

The cloned gene coding for Bacillus licheniformis penicillinase (penP) was introduced into Escherichia coli in a heat-inducible lambda Qam vector. After induction, significant amounts of penicillinase were synthesized in the new host. The cellular location of the penicillinase was found to be almost exclusively the outer membrane fraction of E. coli, and virtually no soluble penicillinase was found. According to sodium dodecyl sulfate-gel electrophoresis, the size of the penicillinase from E. coli was identical to that of the membrane-bound form of the B. licheniformis penicillinase. Gel filtration in the presence of Triton X-100 suggested that the penicillinase from E. coli had amphiphilic properties, as does B. licheniformis membrane penicillinase. These results show that the export of the penicillinase to the outer membrane of E. coli involves the cleavage of the signal peptide from the prepenicillinase, giving an outer membrane component indistinguishable from the membrane penicillinase of B. licheniformis.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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