Stoichiometry, Absolute Abundance, and Localization of Proteins in the Bacillus cereus Spore Coat Insoluble Fraction Determined Using a QconCAT Approach.

Spores of Bacillus cereus pose a threat to food safety due to their high resistance to the heat or acid treatments commonly used to make food microbiologically safe. Spores may survive these treatments and later resume growth either on foodstuffs or, after ingestion, upon entering the gut they are capable of producing toxins, which cause either vomiting or diarrhea. The outer layers of the spore, the spore coat and exosporium, consist primarily of proteins that may serve as potential biomarkers for detection.

'Omics' for microbial food stability: Proteomics for the development of predictive models for bacterial spore stress survival and outgrowth.

Bacterial spores are ubiquitous in nature. They are stress resistant entities that are a concern to microbiological food stability due to their environmental stress resistance. In addition germinating and outgrowing spores at undesired times and places pose a significant health burden.

Temperature Dependence of the Proteome Profile of the Psychrotolerant Pathogenic Food Spoiler Bacillus weihenstephanensis Type Strain WSBC 10204.

Bacillus weihenstephanensis is a subspecies of the Bacillus cereus sensu lato group of spore-forming bacteria known to cause food spoilage or food poisoning. The key distinguishing phenotype of B. weihenstephanensis is its ability to grow below 7 °C or, from a food safety perspective, to grow and potentially produce toxins in a refrigerated environment.

Selective enrichment and identification of cross-linked peptides to study 3-D structures of protein complexes by mass spectrometry.

Chemical cross-linking of protein complexes combined with mass spectrometry is a powerful approach to obtain 3-D structural information by revealing amino residues that are in close spatial proximity. To increase the efficiency of mass spectrometric analysis, we have demonstrated the selective enrichment of cross-linked peptides from the 350 kDa protein complex RNA polymerase (RNAP) from Bacillus subtilis. Bis(succinimidyl)-3-azidomethyl glutarate was used as a cross-linker along with an azide-reactive cyclooctyne-conjugated resin to capture target peptides.