Related Experiment Videos
Phosphocholine of pneumococcal teichoic acids: role in bacterial physiology and pneumococcal infection
1Institut für Biochemie, Med. Fak., Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Erlangen, Germany. W.Fischer@biochem.uni-erlangen.de
Research in Microbiology
|August 29, 2000
Abstract:
Pneumococci have an absolute nutritional requirement for choline. Choline is incorporated as phosphocholine (PCho) into lipoteichoic (LTA) and teichoic acid (TA). The PCho residues are required for transformability, the activity of autolysins, the separation of daughter cells after cell division and for anchoring a family of surface proteins which play important roles in pneumococcal infection. The genes encoding the enzymes for PCho incorporation are described. Two strains that acquired the ability to grow in the absence of choline are discussed.