Porphyromonas gingivalis is a key oral anaerobic bacterium involved in human periodontitis, which may affect up to 15% adults worldwide. Using the membrane permeable fluorescent probe Fe-TRACER, we identified 17 iron-associated proteins in Porphyromonas gingivalis. We demonstrated the specific binding of the probe towards iron-associated proteins using transferrin as an example and provided an X-ray structure of the fluorescent probe-bound transferrin. Our study provides a basis for the understanding of iron homeostasis in pathogens, and our approach based on the integration of fluorescence imaging with proteomics and bioinformatics can be readily extended to mine other metalloproteomes in microbials.

中文翻译：

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通过荧光方法追踪病原体中铁相关的蛋白质组† ‡

牙龈卟啉单胞菌是一种涉及人类牙周炎的关键口腔厌氧细菌，可能会影响全球多达15％的成年人。使用膜渗透荧光探针Fe- TRACER，我们在牙龈卟啉单胞菌中鉴定了17种铁相关蛋白。我们以转铁蛋白为例证明了探针对铁相关蛋白的特异性结合，并提供了荧光探针结合的转铁蛋白的X射线结构。我们的研究为理解病原体中的铁稳态提供了基础，我们基于荧光成像与蛋白质组学和生物信息学相结合的方法可以很容易地扩展到在微生物中开采其他金属蛋白质组。