Amino Acid Repetitions in the Dihydropteroate Synthase of Streptococcus pneumoniae Lead to Sulfonamide Resistance with Limited Effects on Substrate K m

Sulfonamide resistance in Streptococcus pneumoniae is due to changes in the chromosomal folP (sulA) gene coding for dihydropteroate synthase (DHPS). The first reported laboratory-selected sulfonamide-resistant S. pneumoniae isolate had a 6-bp repetition, the sul-d mutation, leading to a repetition of the amino acids Ile(66) and Glu(67) in the gene product DHPS. More recently, clinical isolates showing this and other repetitions have been reported. WA-5, a clinical isolate from Washington State, contains a 6-bp repetition in the folP gene, identical to the sul-d mutation. The repetition was deleted by site-directed mutagenesis. Enzyme kinetic measurements showed that the deletion was associated with a 35-fold difference in K(i) for sulfathiazole but changed the K(m) for p-aminobenzoic acid only 2.5-fold and did not significantly change the K(m) for 2-amino-4-hydroxy-6-hydroxymethyl-7,8-dihydropteridine pyrophosphate. The enzyme characteristics of the deletion variant were identical to those of DHPS from a sulfonamide-susceptible strain. DHPS from clinical isolates with repetitions of Ser(61) had very similar enzyme characteristics to the DHPS from WA-5. The results confirm that the repetitions are sufficient for development of a resistant enzyme and suggest that the fitness cost to the organism of developing resistance may be very low.