Mature Staphylococcus lipoproteins have been found to be dominant immune active TRL2 ligand and to play a crucial role in invasion and persistence of infection. Yet the knowledge of Staphylococcus lipoproteins is still limited: the function of only 35 among 50 genes with a lipobox consensus sequence has been determined by either direct study or homolog sequence prediction. A tandem lipoprotein cluster, which is located on the Staphylococcus aureus nSAa pathogenic island, shows a high biodiversity in all the different S. aureus isolates. The USA300 strain is a recently invasive clone that exhibits the longest cluster of ten tandem lipoproteins.

For more information please contact:

Minh-Thu Nguyen

Telefon: +49 (7071) 29- 74635

minh-thu.nguyen[at]mikrobio.uni-tuebingen.de

Selected references:

1. Baba, T., et al. (2008). Genome sequence of Staphylococcus aureus strain Newman and comparative analysis of staphylococcal genomes: polymorphism and evolution of two major pathogenicity islands. Journal of bacteriology 190, 300-310. [PubMed]

2. Diep, B.A., et al.(2006b). Complete genome sequence of USA300, an epidemic clone of community-acquired meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. Lancet 367, 731-739. [PubMed]