Department of Pathology, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, TX 77555-0609, USA.
Microbes Infect. 2011 Mar;13(3):232-8. doi: 10.1016/j.micinf.2010.10.021. Epub 2010 Nov 9.
Ehrlichia are obligately intracellular bacteria that reside in a vacuole in the cytoplasm of phagocytes. We determined by confocal microscopy the interaction between Ehrlichia and mitochondria in DH82 cells to investigate the mechanism of Ehrlichia survival inside the phagocyte. The most remarkable finding of our study was that Ehrlichia morulae interacted with mitochondria and inhibited mitochondrial metabolism. We showed that in Ehrlichia chaffeensis-infected DH82 cells, mitochondria did not incorporate BrdU and transcriptional level of the mitochondrial gene NADPH2 was significantly reduced, indicating the inhibition of mitochondrial metabolism. This study demonstrates that Ehrlichia are able to inhibit mitochondrial activities, and it opens up a new avenue for the study of Ehrlichia pathogenesis.
埃立克体是严格的细胞内细菌,存在于吞噬细胞细胞质的空泡中。我们通过共聚焦显微镜确定了 DH82 细胞中埃立克体与线粒体之间的相互作用,以研究埃立克体在吞噬细胞内存活的机制。我们研究的最显著发现是,埃立克体包囊与线粒体相互作用并抑制线粒体代谢。我们表明,在感染埃立克体 chaffeensis 的 DH82 细胞中,线粒体不摄取 BrdU,并且线粒体基因 NADPH2 的转录水平显著降低,表明线粒体代谢受到抑制。这项研究表明,埃立克体能够抑制线粒体活性,为研究埃立克体发病机制开辟了新途径。