Bacterial outer membrane

The beta barrels fold to expose a hydrophobic surface before their insertion into the outer membrane.

[6][7][8][9][10] O-antigen repeat units are then polymerised in the periplasm by the Wzy polymerase and ligated to the lipid A-core moiety by the WaaL ligase.

[11][12] The LPS transport machinery is composed of LptA, LptB, LptC, LptD, LptE.

This supported by the fact that depletion of any one of these proteins blocks the LPS assembly pathway and results in very similar outer membrane biogenesis defects.

Moreover, the location of at least one of these five proteins in every cellular compartment suggests a model for how the LPS assembly pathway is organised and ordered in space.

[12][13][14] If lipid A, part of the lipopolysaccharide, enters the circulatory system it causes a toxic reaction by activating toll like receptor TLR 4.