Abstract

Piscirickettsia salmonis is the causative agent of Piscirickettsiosis, a systemic disease generating high mortality rates in farmed salmon cultures of southern Chile. Proteolytic enzymes are important virulence factors since they play a key role in bacterial invasion and proliferation within the host. Bacteria growing in muscle tissues are known to secrete proteases, but no proteolytic enzymes have been described in P. salmonis to date. A battery of putative protease genes was found in the genomes and available strains of P. salmonis by bioinformatics analyses, and their identity was established through comparison with protease genes in databases. The transcript levels of five candidate genes were analysed by in vitro infection and qPCR. All strains were found to generate protease activity to varying degrees, and this was significantly increased when bacteria infected a salmon cell line. Gene expression of several types of proteases was also evidenced, with the highest levels corresponding to the type 1 secretion system (T1SS), which is also involved in the transport of haemolysin A, although transcripts with significant levels of peptidase M4 (thermolysin) and CLP protease were also found.