Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2013 Aug 5;8(8):e71649. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0071649. Print 2013.
Intravaginal infection with C. muridarum in mice often results in hydrosalpinx similar to that found in women urogenitally infected with C. trachomatis, making the C. muridarum lower genital tract infection murine model suitable for studying C. trachomatis pathogenesis. To our surprise, DBA1/j mice were highly resistant to hydrosalpinx following an intravaginal infection with C. muridarum although these mice were as susceptible to lower genital tract infection as other mouse strains. A significantly lower level of C. muridarum organisms was recovered from the oviduct of DBA1/j mice, correlating the resistance to hydrosalpinx with reduced ascension of C. muridarum to the oviduct. The DBA1/j resistance to hydrosalpinx was effectively overcome by intracervical inoculation with C. muridarum. The intracervically inoculated DBA1/j mice developed severe hydrosalpinx with the highest levels of live C. muridarum organisms recovered from uterine tissue on day 3 and oviduct tissue on day 7 post inoculation while in intravaginally inoculated DBA1/j mice, the peak of live organism recovery from uterine tissue was delayed to day 7 with no rise in the amount of live organisms recovered from the oviduct. These observations have not only validated the correlation between hydrosalpinx and live organism invasion in the oviduct but also demonstrated that the intracervical inoculation, by promoting rapid chlamydial replication in the uterine epithelial cells and ascension to the oviduct of DBA1/j mice, may be used for further understanding chlamydial pathogenic mechanisms. The above findings also suggest that strategies aimed at reducing tubal infection may be most effective in blocking tubal pathology.
阴道内感染 C. muridarum 通常会导致类似于女性泌尿生殖道感染 C. trachomatis 引起的输卵管积水，这使得 C. muridarum 下生殖道感染小鼠模型适合研究 C. trachomatis 的发病机制。令我们惊讶的是，尽管 DBA1/j 小鼠与其他小鼠品系一样易感染下生殖道，但在阴道内感染 C. muridarum 后，它们对输卵管积水具有高度抗性。从 DBA1/j 小鼠的输卵管中回收的 C. muridarum 生物体数量明显较低，这与输卵管积水的抗性与 C. muridarum 向输卵管上升的减少相关。通过宫颈内接种 C. muridarum 可有效克服 DBA1/j 对输卵管积水的抗性。宫颈内接种的 DBA1/j 小鼠发生严重的输卵管积水，从子宫组织中回收的活 C. muridarum 生物体数量最高，在接种后第 3 天和从输卵管组织中回收的活 C. muridarum 生物体数量最高，而在阴道内接种的 DBA1/j 小鼠中，从子宫组织中回收活生物体的高峰延迟至第 7 天，从输卵管中回收的活生物体数量没有增加。这些观察结果不仅验证了输卵管积水与输卵管内活生物体侵袭之间的相关性，而且还表明，通过促进 DBA1/j 小鼠子宫上皮细胞中衣原体的快速复制和上升到输卵管，宫颈内接种可用于进一步了解衣原体的致病机制。上述发现还表明，旨在减少输卵管感染的策略可能最有效地阻断输卵管病理学。
