Purification and some properties of Shiga-like toxin from Escherichia coli O157:H7 that is immunologically identical to Shiga toxin.

A cytotoxin to Vero cells (Shiga-like toxin), which was neutralized by antibody against purified Shiga toxin produced by Shigella dysenteriae 1, was purified from Escherichia coli O157:H7, isolated from a patient with hemorrhagic colitis. The purification procedure consisted of ammonium sulfate fractionation, DEAE-cellulose column chromatography, chromatofocusing column chromatography and high performance liquid chromatography. About 200 micrograms of purified Shiga-like toxin was obtained from cell extracts of 14 liters of culture with a yield of about 15%. The purified Shiga-like toxin showed identical physicochemical, biological and immunological properties to those of Shiga toxin. Purified Shiga-like toxin and Shiga toxin also had the same mobilities on polyacrylamide disc gel electrophoresis and polyacrylamide gel isoelectrofocusing. On sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide slab gel electrophoresis, purified Shiga-like toxin migrated as two bands corresponding to the A and B subunits, and these migrated to the same positions as A and B subunits of Shiga toxin. The amino acid composition of the purified Shiga-like toxin was also similar to that of Shiga toxin. The purified Shiga-like toxin showed various biological activities: lethal toxicity to mice when injected intraperitoneally, the LD50 being 30 ng per mouse; cytotoxicity to Vero cells, killing about 50% of the cells at 6 pg; and fluid accumulation in rabbit ileal loops at concentrations of more than 1.25 micrograms/loop. These values are comparable with those obtained with Shiga toxin. In an Ouchterlony double gel diffusion test, the lines formed by the purified Shiga-like toxin and Shiga toxin fused, indicating that the two toxins were immunologically identical.