Isolation of Two Strong Poly (U) Binding Proteins from Moderate Halophile Halomonas eurihalina and Their Identification as Cold Shock Proteins

Cold shock proteins (Csp) are known to be expressed in response to sudden decrease in temperature. They are thought to be involved in a number of cellular processes viz., RNA chaperone activity, translation, transcription, nucleoid condensation. During our studies on ribosomal protein S1 in moderate halophile Halomonas eurihalina, we observed the presence of two strong poly (U) binding proteins in abundance in cell extracts from cells grown under normal growth conditions. The proteins can be isolated in a single step using Poly (U) cellulose chromatography. The proteins were identified as major cold shock proteins belonging to Csp A family by MALDI-TOF and bioinformatic analysis. Csp 12 kDa was found in both exponential and stationary phases whereas Csp 8 kDa is found only in exponential phase.