Receptor-substrate competition for the TonB homolog FusB suggests a model for ferredoxin import
Marta Wojnowska, Victor Flores, Tamas Yelland, Stuart R Fisher, Agnieszka Bogucka, Katherine Stott, Daniel Walker · 2026
Read Receptor-substrate competition for the TonB homolog FusB suggests a model for ferredoxin import by Marta Wojnowska, Victor Flores, Tamas Yelland, Stuart R Fisher, Agnieszka Bogucka, Katherine Stott, Daniel Walker (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/pmc-13253070.txt.
Description
Marta Wojnowska and six co-authors published a 2026 study of how a plant pathogen steals iron from its host. Certain soft rot bacteria import a whole host protein, ferredoxin, across their outer membrane and strip its iron. A helper protein called FusB does two jobs: it opens the plug in the entry channel, then grips the incoming protein to pull it through. The team solved the structures of FusB alone and bound to ferredoxin, and probed the contact surfaces with mutations.
One amino acid on FusB acts as a switch. It first holds the channel protein, then the incoming ferredoxin knocks that partner off and takes its place, reshaping FusB in the process. The authors lay out a step-by-step model of the import. The work explains a rare case of a bacterium importing an entire protein for food.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Marta Wojnowska, Victor Flores, Tamas Yelland, Stuart R Fisher, Agnieszka Bogucka, Katherine Stott, Daniel Walker |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 54 KB |
| VERSION | 1.0 |
| LICENSE | CC BY 4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |