Watanabe Kenta, Iwai Natsumi, Tachibana Masato, Furuoka Hidefumi, Suzuki Hiroshi, Watarai Masahisa
Department of Applied Veterinary Science, Obihiro University of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine, Obihiro, Hokkaido, Japan.
J Vet Med Sci. 2008 Jul;70(7):681-6. doi: 10.1292/jvms.70.681.
Brucella abortus (B. abortus) is a facultative intracellular pathogen that can survive inside macrophages and trophoblast giant cells, and the causative agent of brucellosis. In the present study, we found that production of regulated upon activation normal T-cell expressed and secreted (RANTES) due to B. abortus infection contributes to abortion in pregnant mice. B. abortus infected pregnant interferon-gamma (IFN-gamma) knockout mice died within 15 days of infection, but non-pregnant IFN-gamma knockout mice were still alive. With infection by wild type B. abortus, a large amount of RANTES production was observed in pregnant IFN-gamma knockout mice, and induction of RANTES was also observed in normal pregnant mice infected with the wild type, but not in those infected with the intracellular replication-defective mutant. Production of RANTES and IFN-gamma were inhibited in mice inoculated with the respective RANTES or IFN-gamma antibody. Neutralization of RANTES, induced by B. abortus infection, served to prevent abortion. These results indicate that the production and function of RANTES are correlated with IFN-gamma in pregnant mice infected with B. abortus.
牛布鲁氏菌（B. abortus）是一种兼性细胞内病原体，可在巨噬细胞和滋养层巨细胞内生存，是布鲁氏菌病的病原体。在本研究中，我们发现牛布鲁氏菌感染导致的调节激活正常T细胞表达和分泌因子（RANTES）的产生，会导致怀孕小鼠流产。牛布鲁氏菌感染的怀孕干扰素-γ（IFN-γ）基因敲除小鼠在感染后15天内死亡，但未怀孕的IFN-γ基因敲除小鼠仍然存活。野生型牛布鲁氏菌感染后，在怀孕的IFN-γ基因敲除小鼠中观察到大量RANTES产生，在感染野生型的正常怀孕小鼠中也观察到RANTES的诱导，但在感染细胞内复制缺陷突变体的小鼠中未观察到。在接种了相应RANTES或IFN-γ抗体的小鼠中，RANTES和IFN-γ的产生受到抑制。牛布鲁氏菌感染诱导的RANTES中和作用可防止流产。这些结果表明，在感染牛布鲁氏菌的怀孕小鼠中，RANTES的产生和功能与IFN-γ相关。
