Streptococcus pneumoniae surface protein PfbA is a versatile multidomain and multiligand-binding adhesin employing different binding mechanisms.

Streptococcus pneumoniae, one of the major human respiratory pathogens, uses its repertoire of surface proteins to adhere to the epithelium of the nasopharynx and lungs leading to colonization. PfbA is a conserved surface protein of S. pneumoniae and helps the bacterium to colonize the host by recognizing the extracellular matrix (ECM) molecule fibronectin, as well as blood proteins like plasminogen and human serum albumin. The crystal structure of rPfbA150-607 revealed it to possess a beta-helical region similar to those of carbohydrate-active enzymes as well as a C-terminal segment that resembles the fibronectin-binding regions of fibronectin-binding proteins. To get more insight into the putative carbohydrate-binding property of PfbA and its binding to various host molecules, we generated three different constructs of PfbA and characterized them by ELISA, isothermal titration calorimetry and bio-layer interferometry experiments. Importantly, the isothermal titration calorimetry experiments revealed that PfbA binds to different saccharides. Further, ELISA and bio-layer interferometry experiments identified that (a) apart from fibronectin and plasminogen, the beta helix of PfbA also binds to other ECM molecules (b) lysines are not responsible for PfbA's binding to plasminogen, (c) in comparison with native fibrinogen, deglycosylated-fibrinogen exhibits reduced binding affinity towards PfbA implying the importance of sugar molecule-PfbA interaction and (d) the C-terminal region of PfbA binds exclusively to the N-terminal F1 modules of fibronectin. Thus, the results of this study show PfbA to be a versatile multidomain and multiligand-binding protein employing different binding mechanisms. These results could be useful for structure-based designing of inhibitors against PfbA.