1 virulence and defines a specific adhesive pole of Brucella 2

1 BtaE, an adhesin that belongs to the trimeric autotransporter family, is required for full 1 virulence and defines a specific adhesive pole of Brucella 2 Verónica Ruiz-Ranwez, Diana M. Posadas, Van der Henst Charles, Silvia M. Estein, 3 Gastón M. Arocena, Patricia L. Abdian, Fernando A. Martin, Rodrigo Sieira, Xavier De 4 Bolle and Angeles Zorreguieta 5 6 1 Fundación Instituto Leloir, IIBBA CONICET. Patricias Argentinas 435, (C1405BWE) 7 Buenos Aires, Argentina 8 2 Departamento de Química Biológica, Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, Universidad 9 de Buenos Aires. 10 3 Laboratorio de Inmunología, Facultad de Ciencias Veterinarias, Centro de Investigaciones 11 Veterinarias (CIVETAN), Universidad Nacional del Centro de la Provincia de Buenos Aires 12 (U.N.C.P.B.A), Tandil, Buenos Aires, Argentina. 13 4 Microorganisms Biology Research Unit (URBM), University of Namur (FUNDP), 61 rue de 14 Bruxelles, B-5000 Namur, Belgium 15 16 † Current address: INSERM U1001, Faculté de Médecine Université Paris Descartes, Paris 17 France. 18 # Current address: Department of Molecular Biosciences, Northwestern University, Evanston, 19 Illinois 60208, US. 20 21 Running title: A Brucella pole specialized for adhesion 22 Corresponding author: Phone: 54-11-52387500. 23 Fax: 54-11-52387501. Email: azorreguieta@leloir.org.ar 24 25