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Assessment of protoxin composition of Bacillus thuringiensis strains by use of polyacrylamide gel block and mass spectrometry

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Abstract

Assessment of protoxin composition in Bacillus thuringiensis parasporal crystals is principally hampered by the fact that protoxins in a single strain usually possess high sequence homology. Therefore, new strategies towards the identification of protoxins have been developed. Here, we established a powerful method through embedding solubilized protoxins in a polyacrylamide gel block coupled to liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) analysis of in-gel-generated peptides for protoxin identification. Our model study revealed that four protoxins (Cry1Aa, Cry1Ab, Cry1Ac and Cry2Aa) and six protoxins (Cry4Aa, Cry4Ba, Cry10Aa, Cry11Aa, Cyt1Aa, and Cyt2Ba) could be rapidly identified from B. thuringiensis subsp. kurstaki HD1 and subsp. israelensis 4Q2-72, respectively. The experimental results indicated that our method is a straightforward tool for analyzing protoxin expression profile in B. thuringiensis strains. Given its technical simplicity and sensitivity, our method might facilitate the present screening program for B. thuringiensis strains with new insecticidal properties.

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Acknowledgements

This investigation was supported by 863 grants (2006AA02Z187, 2006AA10A212), SRFDP grant (20060542006), and NSFC (30670052) from China.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Life Science, Hunan Normal University, Changsha, 410081, People’s Republic of China

    Zujiao Fu, Yunjun Sun, Liqiu Xia, Xuezhi Ding, Xiangtao Mo, Xiaohui Li, Kexue Huang & Youming Zhang

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  1. Zujiao Fu
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  2. Yunjun Sun
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  3. Liqiu Xia
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  4. Xuezhi Ding
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  5. Xiangtao Mo
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  6. Xiaohui Li
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  7. Kexue Huang
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  8. Youming Zhang
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Liqiu Xia.

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Zujiao Fu and Yunjun Sun contributed equally to this work.

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Table S1

The full list of identified proteins and their internal tryptic peptides from strains HD1 and 4Q2-72 (DOC 102 KB)

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Fu, Z., Sun, Y., Xia, L. et al. Assessment of protoxin composition of Bacillus thuringiensis strains by use of polyacrylamide gel block and mass spectrometry. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 79, 875–880 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-008-1488-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-008-1488-0

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