Regulation of streptokinase expression by CovR/S in Streptococcus pyogenes: CovR acts through a single high-affinity binding site.

The important human pathogen Streptococcus pyogenes (the group A streptococcus or GAS) produces many virulence factors that are regulated by the two-component signal transduction system CovRS (CsrRS). Dissemination of GAS infection originating at the skin has been shown to require production of streptokinase, whose transcription is repressed by CovR. In this work we have studied the interaction of CovR and phosphorylated CovR (CovR-P) with the promoter for streptokinase, Pska. We found that, in contrast to the other CovR-repressed promoters, Pska regulation by CovR occurs through binding at a single ATTARA consensus binding sequence (CB) that overlaps the -10 region of the promoter. Binding of CovR to other nearby consensus sequences occurs upon phosphorylation of the protein, but these other CBs do not contribute to the regulation of Pska by CovR. Thus, binding at a specific site does not necessarily indicate that the site is involved in regulation by CovR. In addition, at Pska, CovR binding to the different sites does not appear to involve cooperative interactions, which simplifies the analysis of CovR binding and gives us insight into the modes of interaction that occur between CovR and its specific DNA-binding sites. Finally, the observation that regulation of transcription from Pska occurs at a very low concentration of phosphorylated CovR may have important implications for the regulation of virulence gene expression during GAS infection.

CovR activation of the dipeptide permease promoter (PdppA) in Group A Streptococcus.

CovR, the two-component response regulator of Streptococcus pyogenes (group A streptococcus [GAS]) directly or indirectly represses about 15% of the genome, including genes encoding many virulence factors and itself. Transcriptome analyses also showed that some genes are activated by CovR. We asked whether the regulation by CovR of one of these genes, dppA, the first gene in an operon encoding a dipeptide permease, is direct or indirect. Direct regulation by CovR was suggested by the presence of five CovR consensus binding sequences (CBs) near the putative promoter. In this study, we identified the 5' end of the dppA transcript synthesized in vivo and showed that the start of dppA transcription in vitro is the same. We found that CovR binds specifically to the dppA promoter region (PdppA) in vitro with an affinity similar to that at which it binds to other CovR-regulated promoters. Disruption of any of the five CBs by a substitution of GG for TT inhibited CovR binding to that site in vitro, and binding at two of the CBs appeared cooperative. In vivo, CovR activation of transcription was not affected by individual mutations of any of the four CBs that we could study. This suggests that the binding sites are redundant in vivo. In vitro, CovR did not activate transcription from PdppA in experiments using purified GAS RNA polymerase and either linear or supercoiled DNA template. Therefore, we propose that in vivo, CovR may interfere with the binding of a repressor of PdppA.

Phosphorylation of the group A Streptococcal CovR response regulator causes dimerization and promoter-specific recruitment by RNA polymerase.

The group A streptococcus (GAS), Streptococcus pyogenes, is an important human pathogen that causes infections ranging in severity from self-limiting pharyngitis to severe invasive diseases that are associated with significant morbidity and mortality. The pathogenic effects of GAS are mediated by the expression of virulence factors, one of which is the hyaluronic acid capsule (encoded by genes in the has operon). The expression of these virulence factors is controlled by the CovR/S (CsrR/S) two-component regulatory system of GAS which regulates, directly or indirectly, the expression of about 15% of the genome. CovR is a member of the OmpR/PhoB family of transcriptional regulators. Here we show that phosphorylation by acetyl phosphate results in dimerization of CovR. Dimerization was not observed using a D53A mutant of CovR, indicating that D53 is the site of phosphorylation in CovR. Phosphorylation stimulated binding of CovR to a DNA fragment containing the promoter of the has operon (Phas) approximately twofold. Binding of CovR D53A mutant protein to Phas was indistinguishable from the binding of wild-type unphosphorylated CovR. In vitro transcription, using purified GAS RNA polymerase, showed that wild-type CovR repressed transcription, and repression was stimulated more than sixfold by phosphorylation. In the presence of RNA polymerase, binding at Phas of phosphorylated, but not unphosphorylated, CovR was stimulated about fourfold, which accounts for the difference in the effect of phosphorylation on repression versus DNA binding. Thus, regulation of Phas by CovR is direct, and the degree of repression of Phas is controlled by the phosphorylation of CovR.

Binding of the global response regulator protein CovR to the sag promoter of Streptococcus pyogenes reveals a new mode of CovR-DNA interaction.

CovR (CsrR) is a response regulator of gene expression in Streptococcus pyogenes. It regulates approximately 15% of the genome, including the genes encoding several streptococcal virulence factors, and acts primarily as a repressor rather than an activator of transcription. We showed that in vitro, CovR is sufficient to repress transcription from the sag promoter, which directs the expression of streptolysin S, a hemolysin that can damage the membranes of eukaryotic cells and subcellular organelles. Repression was stimulated 10-fold by phosphorylation of CovR with acetyl phosphate. In contrast to binding at the has and cov promoters, which direct the expression of genes involved in capsule biosynthesis and of CovR itself, binding of CovR to Psag was highly cooperative. CovR bound to two extended regions of Psag, an upstream region overlapping the -35 and -10 promoter elements and a downstream region overlapping the translation initiation signals of the sagA gene. Each of these regions contains only a single consensus CovR binding sequence, ATTARA, which at the has promoter defines individual sites to which CovR binds non-cooperatively. At Phas and Pcov the T residues in the sequence ATTARA are important for CovR binding. However, using uracil interference experiments we find that although the ATTARA sequence in the Psag upstream region contains thymine residues important for CovR binding, important thymine residues in the Psag downstream region are located outside this sequence. Furthermore, again in contrast to its behavior at the has and cov promoters where phosphorylation of CovR leads to a 2-3-fold increase in DNA binding affinity, binding of CovR to the sag promoter was stimulated 8-32-fold by phosphorylation. We suggest that these differences in CovR binding mean that individual promoters will be repressed at different intracellular levels of phosphorylated CovR, permitting differences in the response of members of the CovR regulon to environmental and internal metabolic signals.

The CovR response regulator of group A streptococcus (GAS) acts directly to repress its own promoter.

The CovR/S (CsrR/S) two component system is a global regulator of virulence gene expression in the group A streptococcus (GAS, Streptococcus pyogenes). The response regulator, CovR, regulates about 15% of the genes of GAS, including its own operon. Using in vitro DNA binding assays with purified CovR protein, we found that CovR binds a DNA fragment including the covR promoter (Pcov). DNaseI footprint analyses showed that phosphorylation of CovR enhanced and extended the protected regions. The proposed CovR consensus binding sequence (ATTARA) was present at most, but not all protected regions. The effect of replacing the two thymine residues in the consensus binding sequence (CB) with guanine residues was evaluated both in vitro and in vivo. Most, but not all, CB mutations reduced binding of CovR in vitro. Using a transcriptional reporter introduced in single copy into the GAS chromosome, we found that mutations at each CB completely or partially relieved CovR-mediated repression in vivo. This suggests that CovR regulation of Pcov is direct. Further support for this conclusion comes from use of an in vitro GAS transcription system in which CovR was sufficient to mediate repression of Pcov. This repression was enhanced by phosphorylation of the protein. In addition, we found that the CovR binding region overlapping the promoter was essential for wild type repression of Pcov both in vitro and in vivo, suggesting that promoter occlusion is a primary mechanism of Pcov repression by CovR.