Mycobacterium tuberculosis protein PPE2 binds to DNA region containing promoter activity

ppe2 gene is predicted to be present in operon with non pe/ppe genes, cobq1 and cobu as ppe2-cobq1-cobu. Thus, we were interested to investigate the role of ppe2 in operonic organization. We performed microscale thermophoresis (MST) experiment which revealed that PPE2 protein could bind to upstream DNA segments of ppe2-cobq1-cobu operon. Upstream region of ppe2 had shown promoter activity in β-gal assay. In this study, for the first time, a physical interaction between PPE2 protein and DNA fragment was reported, suggesting that PPE2 protein plays a role in the regulation of the putative ppe2-cobq1-cobu operon, via unknown mechanism. •A promoter is present upstream to ppe2 gene from putative ppe2-cobQ1-cobU operon.•PPE2 protein of M.tb has DNA binding property.•MST analysis revealed that PPE2 protein binds to promoter-bearing region.•The study is important for studying operon organization of pe/ppe family in M.tb.