Abstract
Leptospirosis is the most widespread zoonosis caused by the pathogenic Leptospira worldwide. LipL32, a 32-kDa lipoprotein, is the most abundant protein on the outer membrane of Leptospira and has an atypical poly(Asp) motif (161DDDDDGDD 168 ). The x-ray crystallographic structure of LipL32 revealed that the calcium-binding cluster of LipL32 includes several essential residues Asp 132 , Thr 133 , Asp 164 , Asp 165 , and Tyr 178 . The goals of this study were to determine possible roles of the Ca 2+ -binding cluster for the interaction of LipL32 and Toll-like receptor 2 (TLR2) in induced inflammatory responses of human kidney cells. Site-directed mutagenesis was employed to individually mutate Ca 2+ -binding residues of LipL32 to Ala, and their effects subsequently were observed. These mutations abolished primarily the structural integrity of the calcium-binding cluster in LipL32. The binding assay and atomic force microscopy analysis further demonstrated the decreased binding capability of LipL32 mutants to TLR2. Inflammatory responses induced by LipL32 variants, as determined by TLR2 pathway intermediates hCXCL8/IL-8, hCCL2/MCP-1, hMMP7, and hTNF-α, were also lessened. In conclusion, the calcium-binding cluster of LipL32 plays essential roles in presumably sustaining LipL32 conformation for its proper association with TLR2 to elicit inflammatory responses in human renal cells. © 2013 by The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Inc.