Btc22 chaperone is required for secretion and stability of the type III secreted protein Bsp22 in Bordetella bronchiseptica.

The type III secretion system (T3SS) is a sophisticated protein secretion machinery that delivers bacterial virulence proteins into host cells. A needle-tip protein, Bsp22 , is one of the secreted substrates of the T3SS and plays an essential role in the full function of the T3SS in Bordetella bronchiseptica. In this study, we found that BB1618 functions as a chaperone for Bsp22 . The deletion of BB1618 resulted in a dramatic impairment of Bsp22 secretion into the culture supernatants and Bsp22 stability in the bacterial cytosol. In contrast, the secretion of other type III secreted proteins was not affected by the BB1618 mutation. Furthermore, the BB1618 mutant strain could not induce cytotoxicity and displayed the same phenotypes as the Bsp22 mutant strain. An immunoprecipitation assay demonstrated that BB1618 interacts with Bsp22 , but not with BopB and BopD . Thus, we identified BB1618 as a specific type III chaperone for Bsp22 . Therefore, we propose that BB1618 be renamed Btc22 for the Bordetella type III chaperone for Bsp22 .