scholarly journals Yersinia-induced Apoptosis In Vivo Aids in the Establishment of a Systemic Infection of Mice

1998 ◽  
Vol 188 (11) ◽  
pp. 2127-2137 ◽  
Author(s):  
Denise M. Monack ◽  
Joan Mecsas ◽  
Donna Bouley ◽  
Stanley Falkow

Pathogenic Yersinia cause a systemic infection in mice that is dependent on the presence of a large plasmid encoding a number of secreted virulence proteins called Yops. We previously demonstrated that a plasmid-encoded Yop, YopJ, was essential for inducing apoptosis in cultured macrophages. Here we report that YopJ is a virulence factor in mice and is important for the establishment of a systemic infection. The oral LD50 for a yopJ mutant Yersinia pseudotuberculosis increases 64-fold compared with wild-type. Although the yopJ mutant strain is able to reach the spleen of infected mice, the mutant strain seldom reaches the same high bacterial load that is seen with wild-type Yersinia strain and begins to be cleared from infected spleens on day 4 after infection. Furthermore, when in competition with wild-type Yersinia in a mixed infection, the yopJ mutant strain is deficient for spread from the Peyer's patches to other lymphoid tissue. We also show that wild-type Yersinia induces apoptosis in vivo of Mac-1+ cells from infected mesenteric lymph nodes or spleens, as measured by quantitative flow cytometry of TUNEL (Tdt-mediated dUTP–biotin nick-end labeling)-positive cells. The levels of Mac-1+, TUNEL+ cells from tissue infected with the yopJ mutant strain were equivalent to the levels detected in cells from uninfected tissue. YopJ is necessary for the suppression of TNF-α production seen in macrophages infected with wild-type Yersinia, based on previous in vitro studies (Palmer, L.E., S. Hobbie, J.E. Galan, and J.B. Bliska. 1998. Mol. Microbiol. 27:953–965). We conclude here that YopJ plays a role in the establishment of a systemic infection by inducing apoptosis and that this is consistent with the ability to suppress the production of the proinflammatory cytokine tumor necrosis factor α.

2013 ◽  
Vol 81 (6) ◽  
pp. 1952-1963 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael D. Lovelace ◽  
May Lin Yap ◽  
Jana Yip ◽  
William Muller ◽  
Odilia Wijburg ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTPECAM-1/CD31 is known to regulate inflammatory responses and exhibit pro- and anti-inflammatory functions. This study was designed to determine the functional role of PECAM-1 in susceptibility to murine primaryin vivoinfection withSalmonella entericaserovar Typhimurium and inin vitroinflammatory responses of peritoneal macrophages. Lectin profiling showed that cellular PECAM-1 and recombinant human PECAM-1-Ig chimera contain high levels of mannose sugars andN-acetylglucosamine. Consistent with this carbohydrate pattern, both recombinant human and murine PECAM-1-Ig chimeras were shown to bindS. Typhimurium in a dose-dependent mannerin vitro. Using oral and fecal-oral transmission models ofS. Typhimurium SL1344 infection, PECAM-1−/−mice were found to be more resistant toS. Typhimurium infection than wild-type (WT) C57BL/6 mice. While fecal shedding ofS. Typhimurium was comparable in wild-type and PECAM-1−/−mice, the PECAM-1-deficient mice had lower bacterial loads in systemic organs such as liver, spleen, and mesenteric lymph nodes than WT mice, suggesting that extraintestinal dissemination was reduced in the absence of PECAM-1. This reduced bacterial load correlated with reduced tumor necrosis factor (TNF), interleukin-6 (IL-6), and monocyte chemoattractant protein (MCP) levels in sera of PECAM-1−/−mice. Followingin vitrostimulation of macrophages with either wholeS. Typhimurium, lipopolysaccharide (LPS) (Toll-like receptor 4 [TLR4] ligand), or poly(I·C) (TLR3 ligand), production of TNF and IL-6 by PECAM-1−/−macrophages was reduced. Together, these results suggest that PECAM-1 may have multiple functions in resistance to infection withS. Typhimurium, including binding to host cells, extraintestinal spread to deeper tissues, and regulation of inflammatory cytokine production by infected macrophages.


1999 ◽  
Vol 19 (5) ◽  
pp. 3257-3266 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaoya Zeng ◽  
Lihong Chen ◽  
Christine A. Jost ◽  
Ruth Maya ◽  
David Keller ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT The newly identified p53 homolog p73 can mimic the transcriptional activation function of p53. We investigated whether p73, like p53, participates in an autoregulatory feedback loop with MDM2. p73 bound to MDM2 both in vivo and in vitro. Wild-type but not mutant MDM2, expressed in human p53 null osteosarcoma Saos-2 cells, inhibited p73- and p53-dependent transcription driven by the MDM2 promoter-derived p53RE motif as measured in transient-transfection and chloramphenicol acetyltransferase assays and also inhibited p73-induced apoptosis in p53-null human lung adenocarcinoma H1299 cells. MDM2 did not promote the degradation of p73 but instead disrupted the interaction of p73, but not of p53, with p300/CBP by competing with p73 for binding to the p300/CBP N terminus. Both p73α and p73β stimulated the expression of the endogenous MDM2 protein. Hence, MDM2 is transcriptionally activated by p73 and, in turn, negatively regulates the function of this activator through a mechanism distinct from that used for p53 inactivation.


2001 ◽  
Vol 281 (5) ◽  
pp. G1140-G1150 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lynn Edde ◽  
Ronaldo B. Hipolito ◽  
Freda F. Y. Hwang ◽  
Denis R. Headon ◽  
Robert A. Shalwitz ◽  
...  

Lactoferrin is a milk protein that reportedly protects infants from gut-related, systemic infection. Proof for this concept is limited and was addressed during in vivo and in vitro studies. Neonatal rats pretreated orally with recombinant human lactoferrin (rh-LF) had less bacteremia and lower disease severity scores ( P < 0.001) after intestinal infection with Escherichia coli. Control animals had 1,000-fold more colony-forming units of E. coli per milliliter of blood than treated animals ( P < 0.001). Liver cultures from control animals had a twofold increase in bacterial counts compared with cultures from rh-LF-treated pups ( P < 0.02). Oral therapy with rh-LF + FeSO4did not alter the protective effect. In vitro studies confirmed that rh-LF interacted with the infecting bacterium and rat macrophages. An in vitro assay showed that rh-LF did not kill E. coli, but a combination of rh-LF + lysozyme was microbicidal. In vitro studies showed that rat macrophages released escalating amounts of nitric oxide and tumor necrosis factor-α when stimulated with increasing concentrations of rh-LF. The in vitro studies suggest that rh-LF may act with other “natural peptide antibiotics” or may prime macrophages to kill E. coli in vivo.


1998 ◽  
Vol 188 (11) ◽  
pp. 1985-1992 ◽  
Author(s):  
Azumi Hamasaki ◽  
Fujiro Sendo ◽  
Keiko Nakayama ◽  
Noriko Ishida ◽  
Izumi Negishi ◽  
...  

To elucidate the role of A1, a new member of the Bcl-2 family of apoptosis regulators active in hematopoietic cell apoptosis, we established mice lacking A1-a, a subtype of the A1 gene in mice (A1-a−/− mice). Spontaneous apoptosis of peripheral blood neutrophils of A1-a−/− mice was enhanced compared with that of either wild-type mice or heterozygous mutants (A1-a+/− mice). Neutrophil apoptosis inhibition induced by lipopolysaccharide treatment in vitro or transendothelial migration in vivo observed in wild-type mice was abolished in both A1-a−/− and A1-a+/− animals. On the other hand, the extent of tumor necrosis factor α–induced acceleration of neutrophil apoptosis did not differ among A1-a−/−, A1-a+/−, and wild-type mice. The descending order of A1 mRNA expression was wild-type, A1-a+/−, and A1-a−/−. Taken together, these results suggest that A1 is involved in inhibition of certain types of neutrophil apoptosis.


2003 ◽  
Vol 185 (16) ◽  
pp. 4672-4682 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shruti Haralalka ◽  
Suvobroto Nandi ◽  
Rupak K. Bhadra

ABSTRACT The relA gene product determines the level of (p)ppGpp, the effector nucleotides of the bacterial stringent response that are also involved in the regulation of other functions, like antibiotic production and quorum sensing. In order to explore the possible involvement of relA in the regulation of virulence of Vibrio cholerae, a relA homolog from the organism (relA VCH) was cloned and sequenced. The relA VCH gene encodes a 738-amino-acid protein having functions similar to those of other gram-negative bacteria, including Escherichia coli. A ΔrelA::kan allele was generated by replacing ∼31% of the open reading frame of wild-type relA of V. cholerae El Tor strain C6709 with a kanamycin resistance gene. The V. cholerae relA mutant strain thus generated, SHK17, failed to accumulate (p)ppGpp upon amino acid deprivation. Interestingly, compared to the wild type, C6709, the mutant strain SHK17 exhibited significantly reduced in vitro production of two principal virulence factors, cholera toxin (CT) and toxin-coregulated pilus (TCP), under virulence gene-inducing conditions. In vivo experiments carried out in rabbit ileal loop and suckling mouse models also confirmed our in vitro results. The data suggest that (p)ppGpp is essential for maximal expression of CT and TCP during in vitro growth, as well as during intestinal infection by virulent V. cholerae. Northern blot and reverse transcriptase PCR analyses indicated significant reduction in the transcript levels of both virulence factors in the relA mutant strain SHK17. Such marked alteration of virulence phenotypes in SHK17 appears most likely to be due to down regulation of transcript levels of toxR and toxT, the two most important virulence regulatory genes of V. cholerae. In SHK17, the altered expression of the two outer membrane porin proteins, OmpU and OmpT, indicated that the relA mutation most likely affects the ToxR-dependent virulence regulatory pathway, because it had been shown earlier that ToxR directly regulates their expression independently of ToxT.


2003 ◽  
Vol 71 (8) ◽  
pp. 4595-4607 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren K. Logsdon ◽  
Joan Mecsas

ABSTRACT The gram-negative enteric pathogen Yersinia pseudotuberculosis employs a type III secretion system and effector Yop proteins that are required for virulence. Mutations in the type III secretion-translocation apparatus have been shown to cause defects in colonization of the murine cecum, suggesting roles for one or more effector Yops in the intestinal tract. To investigate this possibility, isogenic yop mutant strains were tested for their ability to colonize and persist in intestinal and associated lymph tissues of the mouse following orogastric inoculation. In single-strain infections, a yopHEMOJ mutant strain was unable to colonize, replicate, or persist in intestinal and lymph tissues. A yopH mutant strain specifically fails to colonize the mesenteric lymph nodes, but yopE and yopO mutant strains showed only minor defects in persistence in intestinal and lymph tissues. While no single Yop was found to be essential for colonization or persistence in intestinal tissues in single-strain infections, the absence of both YopH and YopE together almost eliminated colonization of all tissues, indicating either that these two Yops have some redundant functions or that Y. pseudotuberculosis employs multiple strategies for colonization. In competition infections with wild-type Y. pseudotuberculosis, the presence of wild-type bacteria severely hindered the ability of the yopH, yopE, and yopO mutants to persist in many tissues, suggesting that the wild-type bacteria either fills colonization niches or elicits host responses that the yop mutants are unable to withstand.


2002 ◽  
Vol 76 (2) ◽  
pp. 717-729 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maryam Ahmed ◽  
Martin Lock ◽  
Cathie G. Miller ◽  
Nigel W. Fraser

ABSTRACT Recent studies have suggested that the latency-associated transcript (LAT) region of herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) is effective at blocking virus-induced apoptosis both in vitro and in the trigeminal ganglia of acutely infected rabbits (Inman et al., J. Virol. 75:3636–3646, 2001; Perng et al., Science 287:1500–1503, 2000). By transfecting cells with a construct expressing the Pst-Mlu segment of the LAT, encompassing the LAT exon 1, the stable 2.0-kb intron, and 5′ part of exon 2, we confirmed that this region was able to diminish the onset of programmed cell death initiated by anti-Fas and camptothecin treatment. In addition, caspase 8-induced apoptosis was specifically inhibited in cells expressing the Pst-Mlu LAT fragment. To further delineate the minimal region of LAT that is necessary for this antiapoptotic function, LAT mutants were used in our cotransfection assays. In HeLa cells, the plasmids lacking exon sequences were the least effective at blocking apoptosis. However, similar to previous work (Inman et al., op. cit.), our data also indicated that the 5′ end of the stable 2.0-kb LAT intron appeared to contribute to the promotion of cell survival. Furthermore, cells productively infected with the 17N/H LAT mutant virus, a virus deleted in the LAT promoter, exon 1, and about half of the intron, exhibited a greater degree of DNA fragmentation than cells infected with wild-type HSV-1. These data support the finding that the exon 1 and 2.0-kb intron region of the LAT transcription unit display an antiapoptotic function both in transfected cells and in the context of the virus infection in vitro. In trigeminal ganglia of mice acutely infected with the wild-type virus, 17, and 17ΔSty, a virus lacking most of exon 1, apoptosis was not detected in cells that were positive for virus particles. However, dual staining was observed in cells from mice infected with 17N/H virus, indicating that the LAT antiapoptotic function demonstrated in cells transfected by LAT-expressing constructs may also play a role in protecting cells from virus-induced apoptosis during acute viral infection in vivo.


2017 ◽  
Vol 85 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ummehan Avican ◽  
Tugrul Doruk ◽  
Yngve Östberg ◽  
Anna Fahlgren ◽  
Åke Forsberg

ABSTRACT The twin arginine translocation (Tat) system targets folded proteins across the inner membrane and is crucial for virulence in many important human-pathogenic bacteria. Tat has been shown to be required for the virulence of Yersinia pseudotuberculosis, and we recently showed that the system is critical for different virulence-related stress responses as well as for iron uptake. In this study, we wanted to address the role of the Tat substrates in in vivo virulence. Therefore, 22 genes encoding potential Tat substrates were mutated, and each mutant was evaluated in a competitive oral infection of mice. Interestingly, a ΔsufI mutant was essentially as attenuated for virulence as the Tat-deficient strain. We also verified that SufI was Tat dependent for membrane/periplasmic localization in Y. pseudotuberculosis. In vivo bioluminescent imaging of orally infected mice revealed that both the ΔsufI and ΔtatC mutants were able to colonize the cecum and Peyer's patches (PPs) and could spread to the mesenteric lymph nodes (MLNs). Importantly, at this point, neither the ΔtatC mutant nor the ΔsufI mutant was able to spread systemically, and they were gradually cleared. Immunostaining of MLNs revealed that both the ΔtatC and ΔsufI mutants were unable to spread from the initial infection foci and appeared to be contained by neutrophils, while wild-type bacteria readily spread to establish multiple foci from day 3 postinfection. Our results show that SufI alone is required for the establishment of systemic infection and is the major cause of the attenuation of the ΔtatC mutant.


2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (113) ◽  
pp. 20150702 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Dybowski ◽  
Olivier Restif ◽  
Alexandre Goupy ◽  
Duncan J. Maskell ◽  
Piero Mastroeni ◽  
...  

Intravenous inoculation of Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium into mice is a prime experimental model of invasive salmonellosis. The use of wild-type isogenic tagged strains (WITS) in this system has revealed that bacteria undergo independent bottlenecks in the liver and spleen before establishing a systemic infection. We recently showed that those bacteria that survived the bottleneck exhibited enhanced growth when transferred to naive mice. In this study, we set out to disentangle the components of this in vivo adaptation by inoculating mice with WITS grown either in vitro or in vivo . We developed an original method to estimate the replication and killing rates of bacteria from experimental data, which involved solving the probability-generating function of a non-homogeneous birth–death–immigration process. This revealed a low initial mortality in bacteria obtained from a donor animal. Next, an analysis of WITS distributions in the livers and spleens of recipient animals indicated that in vivo -passaged bacteria started spreading between organs earlier than in vitro -grown bacteria. These results further our understanding of the influence of passage in a host on the fitness and virulence of Salmonella enterica and represent an advance in the power of investigation on the patterns and mechanisms of host–pathogen interactions.


2006 ◽  
Vol 74 (12) ◽  
pp. 6907-6919 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Hamilton ◽  
Carl Robinson ◽  
Iain C. Sutcliffe ◽  
Josh Slater ◽  
Duncan J. Maskell ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT Streptococcus equi is the causative agent of strangles, a prevalent and highly contagious disease of horses. Despite the animal suffering and economic burden associated with strangles, little is known about the molecular basis of S. equi virulence. Here we have investigated the contributions of a specific lipoprotein and the general lipoprotein processing pathway to the abilities of S. equi to colonize equine epithelial tissues in vitro and to cause disease in both a mouse model and the natural host in vivo. Colonization of air interface organ cultures after they were inoculated with a mutant strain deficient in the maturase lipoprotein (ΔprtM 138 - 213, with a deletion of nucleotides 138 to 213) was significantly less than that for cultures infected with wild-type S. equi strain 4047 or a mutant strain that was unable to lipidate preprolipoproteins (Δlgt 190 - 685). Moreover, mucus production was significantly greater in both wild-type-infected and Δlgt 190 - 685-infected organ cultures. Both mutants were significantly attenuated compared with the wild-type strain in a mouse model of strangles, although 2 of 30 mice infected with the Δlgt 190 - 685 mutant did still exhibit signs of disease. In contrast, only the ΔprtM 138 - 213 mutant was significantly attenuated in a pony infection study, with 0 of 5 infected ponies exhibiting pathological signs of strangles compared with 4 of 4 infected with the wild-type and 3 of 5 infected with the Δlgt 190 - 685 mutant. We believe that this is the first study to evaluate the contribution of lipoproteins to the virulence of a gram-positive pathogen in its natural host. These data suggest that the PrtM lipoprotein is a potential vaccine candidate, and further investigation of its activity and its substrate(s) are warranted.


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