Search

The porcine Helicobacter suis and canine-feline H. heilmannii are gastric Helicobacter species with zoonotic potential. However, little is known about the pathogenesis of human infections with these Helicobacter species. To gain more insight into the interactions of both zoonotic Helicobacter species with human gastric epithelial cells, we investigated bacterial genes that are differentially expressed in a H. suis and H. heilmannii strain after adhesion to the human gastric epithelial cell line MKN7. In vitro Helicobacter-MKN7 binding assays were performed to obtain bacterial RNA for sequencing analysis. H. suis and H. heilmannii bacteria attached to the gastric epithelial cells (i.e. cases) as well as unbound bacteria (i.e. controls) were isolated, after which prokaryotic RNA was purified and sequenced. Differentially expressed genes were identified using the DESeq2 package and SARTools pipeline in R. A list of 134 (83 up-regulated and 51 down-regulated) and 143 (60 up-regulated and 83 down-regulated) differentially expressed genes (p adj  ≤ 0.01; fold change ≥ 2) were identified for the adherent H. suis and H. heilmannii strains, respectively. According to BLASTp analyses, only 2 genes were commonly up-regulated and 4 genes commonly down-regulated in both pathogens. Differentially expressed genes of the H. suis and H. heilmannii strains belonged to multiple functional classes, indicating that adhesion of both strains to human gastric epithelial cells evokes pleiotropic adaptive responses. Our results suggest that distinct pathways are involved in human gastric colonization of H. suis and H. heilmannii. Further research is needed to elucidate the clinical significance of these findings.

The impact of cortisol on Flavobacterium columnare biofilm formation was explored. Firstly, the dynamics of biofilm formation by one highly (HV) and one low virulent (LV) F. columnare isolate with and without the stress hormone cortisol under microfluidic flow conditions was characterized. This to confirm that F. columnare cells could form biofilm under cortisol supplementation, and to compare the temporal and structural differences between different treatment groups. One trial revealed that in both isolates cell aggregates resembling biofilms occurred within 7-h post-inoculation. Consequently, cell clusters were sloughed away, followed by a rebuilding of bacterial cell aggregates, suggestive for a high spreading capacity. While the HV isolate revealed cell aggregates formed upstream at all time-points, for the LV isolate this was only seen upon cortisol supplementation. Secondly, the transcriptional effect of genes (gldK, gldL, gldM, gldN, sprA, sprE, sprT, and porV) belonging to the Type IX secretion system involved in gliding motility was investigated in planktonic and biofilm cells of a HV and LV isolate to which no, a low (LD) or high (HD) dose of cortisol was added. Significantly lower expression of gliding genes gldK, gldL, gldM and gldN, and of protein secretion regulator porV was seen in the LV isolate planktonic cells supplemented with a HD-cortisol. The LV isolate biofilm cells treated with the HD-cortisol showed a significant upregulation of sprT, encoding mobile surface adhesion important in bacterial colonization. This is the first evidence for the co-regulatory effect of cortisol on biofilm formation and F. columnare gliding gene expression.

Background: Protein-protein interactions are at the basis of many cellular processes, and they are also involved in the interaction between pathogens and their host(s). Many intracellular pathogenic bacteria translocate proteins called effectors into the cytoplasm of the infected host cell, and these effectors can interact with one or several host protein(s). An effector named RicA was recently reported in Brucella abortus to specifically interact with human Rab2 and to affect intracellular trafficking of this pathogen., Results: In order to identify regions of the RicA protein involved in the interaction with Rab2, RicA was subjected to extensive random mutagenesis using error prone polymerase chain reaction. The resulting allele library was selected by the yeast two-hybrid assay for Rab2-interacting clones that were isolated and sequenced, following the "absence of interference" approach. A tridimensional model of RicA structure was used to position the substitutions that did not affect RicA-Rab2 interaction, giving a "negative image" of the putative interaction region. Since RicA is a bacterial conserved protein, RicA homologs were also tested against Rab2 in a yeast two-hybrid assay, and the C. crescentus homolog of RicA was found to interact with human Rab2. Analysis of the RicA structural model suggested that regions involved in the folding of the "beta helix" or an exposed loop with the IGFP sequence could also be involved in the interaction with Rab2. Extensive mutagenesis of the IGFP loop suggested that loss of interaction with Rab2 was correlated with insolubility of the mutated RicA, showing that "absence of interference" approach also generates surfaces that could be necessary for folding., Conclusion: Extensive analysis of substitutions in RicA unveiled two structural elements on the surface of RicA, the most exposed β-sheet and the IGFP loop, which could be involved in the interaction with Rab2 and protein folding. Our analysis of mutants in the IGFP loop suggests that, at least for some mono-domain proteins such as RicA, protein interaction analysis using allele libraries could be complicated by the dual effect of many substitutions affecting both folding and protein-protein interaction.