Molecular biology of phase-variable lipopolysaccharide biosynthesis by Haemophilus influenzae

Several chromosomal loci are involved in lipopolysaccharide (LPS) biosynthesis by Haemophilus influenzae. Two of these, lic1 and lic2, contain multiple open-reading frames (ORFs) and include tandem repeats of the tetramer CAAT within and at the 5' end of the coding region of the first ORF in each locus. Variation in the number of repeats of CAAT is involved in the variable expression of LPS epitopes, and genes within these loci are involved in the biosynthesis of these epitopes. lic3 also contains multiple ORFs and the CAAT repeats in the same arrangement as in the other two lic loci. However, in lic3 metabolic functions are encoded by the downstream genes. ORF2 is galE, encoding uridine 5'-diphosphogalactose 4-epimerase, and ORF4 is adk, encoding adenylate kinase. A mutant H. influenzae with a deleted galE gene had an altered LPS when grown on media lacking galactose and was of reduced virulence in infant rats.