Abstract
Curvacin A is a bacteriocin produced by Lactobacillus curvatus LTH1174 which is a potential starter organism for the production of fermented dry sausages. This peptide inhibits the growth of the opportunistic food pathogens Listeria monocytogenes and Enterococcus faecalis and thus, curvacin A may enable better performance of a starter and improvement of the hygienic status of meat products. Oligonucleotides were constructed deduced from the peptide sequence and used for the identification of the curvacin A structural gene cur A on a 60 kb plasmid of L. curvatus LTH1174. Plasmidcured derivatives of this strain were unable to produce curvacin A but were still resistant to the bacteriocin. Cur A was cloned into Escherichia coli NM554 and its nucleotide sequence was determined. Sequencing revealed the presence of an additional open reading frame of 51 amino acids with unknown function. A promoter was detected upstream of cur A by primer extension. Both reading frames form a single transcript. Curvacin A is synthesised as a prepeptide of 59 amino acids which is proteolytically processed to the mature bacteriocin of 41 amino acids.
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Tichaczek, P.S., Vogel, R.F. & Hammes, W.P. Cloning and sequencing of cur A encoding curvacin A, the bacteriocin produced by Lactobacillus curvatus LTH1174. Arch. Microbiol. 160, 279–283 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00292077
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00292077