ArticleJournal of bacteriology2022
Mycobacterium tuberculosis EspK Has Active but Distinct Roles in the Secretion of EsxA and EspB.
Article in Journal of bacteriology, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 20 citations in OpenAlex.
- In Host Mutational Adaptation of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis Complex Strains During Tuberculosis Infection.The Journal of infectious diseases · 2026Pooled it
- Variation in multiple classes of simple sequence repeats can alter drug susceptibility inbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Comparative genomics and epidemic success of Mycobacterium tuberculosis lineage 4 in eastern China.BMC genomics · 2026Article
- Functional analysis of type VII secretion system links to host immune evasion mechanism inFrontiers in cellular and infection microbiology · 2026Review
- Control of Mycobacterium tuberculosis protein secretion by ESX-4 and the outer membrane EsxUT-EsxEF complex.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Assembly of theMicrobiology spectrum · 2025Article
- Generation of novel polyclonal antibodies against Mycobacterium tuberculosis lipoarabinomannan, EspB, and Mtb8.Applied microbiology and biotechnology · 2025Article
- In vivo regulation of the monocyte phenotype by Mycobacterium marinum and the ESX-1 type VII secretion system.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Assessing the propensity of TB clinical isolates to form viable but non-replicating subpopulations.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Transposon sequencing reveals metabolic pathways essential for Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection.PLoS pathogens · 2024Article
- Insight into the drug-resistant characteristics and genetic diversity of multidrug-resistantMicrobiology spectrum · 2023Article
- Phase variation as a major mechanism of adaptation inProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2023Article
- Uptake-independent killing of macrophages by extracellular Mycobacterium tuberculosis aggregates.The EMBO journal · 2023Article
- Proteo-genetic analysis reveals clear hierarchy of ESX-1 secretion inProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2022Article
- Non-Coding RNAs in Tuberculosis Epidemiology: Platforms and Approaches for Investigating the Genome's Dark Matter.International journal of molecular sciences · 2022Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
The Mycobacterium tuberculosis type-7 protein secretion system ESX-1 is a major driver of its virulence. While the functions of most ESX-1 components are characterized, many others remain poorly defined. In this study, we examined the role of EspK, an ESX-1-associated protein that is thought to be dispensable for ESX-1 activity in members of the Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex. We show that EspK is needed for the timely and optimal secretion of EsxA and absolutely essential for EspB secretion in M. tuberculosis Erdman. We demonstrate that only the EsxA secretion defect can be alleviated in EspK-deficient M. tuberculosis by culturing it in media containing detergents like Tween 80 or tyloxapol. Subcellular fractionation experiments reveal EspK is exported by M. tuberculosis in an ESX-1-independent manner and localized to its cell wall. We also show a conserved W-X-G motif in EspK is important for its interaction with EspB and enabling its secretion. The same motif, however, is not important for EspK localization in the cell wall. Finally, we show EspB in EspK-deficient M. tuberculosis tends to adopt higher-order oligomeric conformations, more so than EspB in wild-type M. tuberculosis. These results suggest EspK interacts with EspB and prevents it from assembling prematurely into macromolecular complexes that are presumably too large to pass through the membrane-spanning ESX-1 translocon assembly. Collectively, our findings indicate M. tuberculosis EspK has a far more active role in ESX-1-mediated secretion than was previously appreciated and underscores the complex nature of this secretion apparatus.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.