The kappa-carrageenase of the marine bacterium Cytophaga drobachiensis. Structural and phylogenetic relationships within family-16 glycoside hydrolases

Abstract

We report here cloning from the marine gliding bacterium Cytophaga drobachiensis of κ-carrageenase, a glycoside hydrolase involved in the degradation of κ-carrageenan. Structural features in the nucleotide sequence are pointed out, including the presence of an octameric Ω sequence similar to the ribosome-binding sites of various eukaryotes and prokaryotes. The cgkA gene codes for a protein of 545 aa, with a signal peptide of 35 aa and a 229- aa-long posttranslationaly processed C-terminal domain. The enzyme displays the overall folding and catalytic domain characteristics of family 16 of glycoside hydrolases, which comprises other β-1,4-α-1,3-D/L-galactan hydrolases, β-1,3-D-glucan hydrolases (laminarinases), β-1,4-1,3-D-glucan hydrolases (lichenases), and β-1,4-D-xyloglucan endotransglycosylases. In order to address the origin and evolution of CgkA, a comprehensive phylogenetic tree of family 16 was built using parsimony analysis. Family-16 glycoside hydrolases cluster according to their substrate specificity, regardless of their phylogenetic distribution over eubacteria and eukaryotes. Such a topology suggests that the general homology between laminarinases, agarases, κ-carrageenases, lichenases, and xyloglucan endotransglycosylases has arisen through gene duplication, likely from an ancestral protein with laminarinase activity.