Research

A proteome-wide protein interaction map for Campylobacter jejuni

Jodi R Parrish¹ , Jingkai Yu¹ , Guozhen Liu¹ , Julie A Hines¹ , Jason E Chan³ , Bernie A Mangiola¹ , Huamei Zhang¹ , Svetlana Pacifico¹ , Farshad Fotouhi⁴ , Victor J DiRita⁵ , Trey Ideker³ , Phillip Andrews⁶ and Russell L Finley Jr^1,2

¹Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, MI, USA 48201

²Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, MI, USA 48201

³Department of Bioengineering and Program in Bioinformatics, University of California at San Diego, San Diego, CA, USA 92093

⁴Department of Computer Science, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, USA 48201

⁵Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI, USA 48109

⁶Department of Biological Chemistry, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI, USA 48109

author email corresponding author email

Genome Biology 2007, 8:R130doi:10.1186/gb-2007-8-7-r130

Published:	5 July 2007

Subject areas: Microbiology and parasitology, Genome studies, Medicine

Abstract

Background

Data from large-scale protein interaction screens for humans and model eukaryotes have been invaluable for developing systems-level models of biological processes. Despite this value, only a limited amount of interaction data is available for prokaryotes. Here we report the systematic identification of protein interactions for the bacterium Campylobacter jejuni, a food-borne pathogen and a major cause of gastroenteritis worldwide.

Results

Using high-throughput yeast two-hybrid screens we detected and reproduced 11,687 interactions. The resulting interaction map includes 80% of the predicted C. jejuni NCTC11168 proteins and places a large number of poorly characterized proteins into networks that provide initial clues about their functions. We used the map to identify a number of conserved subnetworks by comparison to protein networks from Escherichia coli and Saccharomyces cerevisiae. We also demonstrate the value of the interactome data for mapping biological pathways by identifying the C. jejuni chemotaxis pathway. Finally, the interaction map also includes a large subnetwork of putative essential genes that may be used to identify potential new antimicrobial drug targets for C. jejuni and related organisms.

Conclusion

The C. jejuni protein interaction map is one of the most comprehensive yet determined for a free-living organism and nearly doubles the binary interactions available for the prokaryotic kingdom. This high level of coverage facilitates pathway mapping and function prediction for a large number of C. jejuni proteins as well as orthologous proteins from other organisms. The broad coverage also facilitates cross-species comparisons for the identification of evolutionarily conserved subnetworks of protein interactions.