Tyson Jessica Y, Vargas Paloma, Cianciotto Nicholas P
Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Northwestern University Medical School, Chicago, IL 60611, USA.
Microbiology (Reading). 2014 Dec;160(Pt 12):2732-2744. doi: 10.1099/mic.0.082750-0. Epub 2014 Sep 24.
The type II protein secretion (T2S) system of Legionella pneumophila secretes over 25 proteins, including novel proteins that have no similarity to proteins of known function. T2S is also critical for the ability of L. pneumophila to grow within its natural amoebal hosts, including Acanthamoeba castellanii, Hartmannella vermiformis and Naegleria lovaniensis. Thus, T2S has an important role in the natural history of legionnaires' disease. Our previous work demonstrated that the novel T2S substrate NttA promotes intracellular infection of A. castellanii, whereas the secreted RNase SrnA, acyltransferase PlaC, and metalloprotease ProA all promote infection of H. vermiformis and N. lovaniensis. In this study, we determined that another novel T2S substrate that is specific to Legionella, designated NttC, is unique in being required for intracellular infection of H. vermiformis but not for infection of N. lovaniensis or A. castellanii. Expanding our repertoire of amoebal hosts, we determined that Willaertia magna is susceptible to infection by L. pneumophila strains 130b, Philadelphia-1 and Paris. Furthermore, T2S and, more specifically, NttA, NttC and PlaC were required for infection of W. magna. Taken together, these data demonstrate that the T2S system of L. pneumophila is critical for infection of at least four types of aquatic amoebae and that the importance of the individual T2S substrates varies in a host cell-specific fashion. Finally, it is now clear that novel T2S-dependent proteins that are specific to the genus Legionella are particularly important for L. pneumophila infection of key, environmental hosts.
嗜肺军团菌的II型蛋白质分泌(T2S)系统可分泌超过25种蛋白质,包括与已知功能蛋白质无相似性的新蛋白质。T2S对于嗜肺军团菌在其天然变形虫宿主(包括卡氏棘阿米巴、蠕虫哈氏变形虫和洛万内氏耐格里阿米巴)内生长的能力也至关重要。因此,T2S在军团病的自然病程中具有重要作用。我们之前的研究表明,新型T2S底物NttA促进卡氏棘阿米巴的细胞内感染,而分泌的核糖核酸酶SrnA、酰基转移酶PlaC和金属蛋白酶ProA均促进蠕虫哈氏变形虫和洛万内氏耐格里阿米巴的感染。在本研究中,我们确定了另一种军团菌特有的新型T2S底物,命名为NttC,其独特之处在于它是蠕虫哈氏变形虫细胞内感染所必需的,但不是洛万内氏耐格里阿米巴或卡氏棘阿米巴感染所必需的。扩大我们的变形虫宿主范围后,我们确定大威氏变形虫易受嗜肺军团菌菌株130b、费城-1和巴黎株的感染。此外,T2S,更具体地说,NttA、NttC和PlaC是感染大威氏变形虫所必需的。综上所述,这些数据表明嗜肺军团菌的T2S系统对于至少四种水生变形虫的感染至关重要,并且各个T2S底物的重要性因宿主细胞而异。最后,现在很清楚,军团菌属特有的新型T2S依赖性蛋白质对于嗜肺军团菌感染关键环境宿主尤为重要。