IDENTIFICATION OF A NEW GENE, TMOF, IN THE PSEUDOMONAS-MENDOCINA KR1 GENE-CLUSTER ENCODING TOLUENE-4-MONOOXYGENASE

Five genes, tmoABCDE, encoding toluene-4-monooxygenase (T4MO) were previously mapped to a 3.6-kb region of a 10.2-kb SacI DNA fragment isolated from Pseudomonas mendocina KR1 (K.-M. Yen, M. R. Karl, L. M. Blatt, M. J. Simon, R. B. Winter, P. R. Fausset, H. S. Lu, A. A. Harcourt, and K. K. Chen, J. Bacteriol. 173:5315-5327, 1991). In this report, we describe the identification and characterization of a DNA region in the SacI fragment whose expression enhances the T4MO activity determined by the tmoABCDE gene cluster. This region was mapped immediately downstream of the putative transcription termination sequence previously located at the end of the tmoABCDE gene cluster (Yen et al., J. Bacteriol., 1991) and was found to stimulate T4MO activity two- to threefold when expressed in Escherichia coli or Pseudomonas putida. Determination of the nucleotide sequence of this region revealed an open reading frame (ORF) of 978 bp. Expression of the ORF resulted in the synthesis of an approximately 37-kDa polypeptide whose N-terminal amino acid sequence completely matched that of the product predicted from the ORF. The ORF thus defines a gene, which has now been designated tmoF. The TmoF protein shares amino acid sequence homology with the reductases of several mono- and dioxygenase systems. In addition, the reductase component of the naphthalene dioxygenase system, encoded by the nahA(a) gene of plasmid NAH7 from P. putida G7, could largely replace the TmoF protein in stimulating T4MO activity, and TmoF could partially replace the NahA(a) protein in forming active naphthalene dioxygenase. The overall properties of tmoF suggest that it is a member of the T4MO gene cluster and encodes the NADH:ferredoxin oxidoreductase of the T4MO system.