Clavijo-Giraldo Diana M, Matínez-Alvarez José A, Lopes-Bezerra Leila M, Ponce-Noyola Patricia, Franco Bernardo, Almeida Ricardo S, Mora-Montes Héctor M
Departamento de Biología, División de Ciencias Naturales y Exactas, Campus Guanajuato, Universidad de Guanajuato, Guanajuato, Mexico.
Laboratório de Micologia Celular e Proteômica, Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil.
J Microbiol Methods. 2016 Mar;122:73-7. doi: 10.1016/j.mimet.2016.01.014. Epub 2016 Jan 28.
The study of the host-pathogen interaction is essential to understand the mechanisms underlying adhesion, colonization and tissue damage by pathogens. This is usually achieved by performing in vivo studies using small mammals, such as rats, mice and guinea pigs. Nowadays, the mouse models of systemic or subcutaneous infection are the gold standard assays to analyze the virulence of members of the Sporothrix schenckii complex. There are, however, invertebrates that have been recently used as alternative hosts to assess the virulence of both bacteria and fungi, and among them, larvae of Galleria mellonella are popular because they are easy to breed, and require non-specialized facilities to maintain the colony. Here, we assessed the use of G. mellonella larvae to test the virulence of S. schenckii sensu stricto and Sporothrix brasiliensis strains, and found that infection with yeast-like cells, but not with conidia or germlings, reproduces the virulence data generated in the mouse model of infection. Furthermore, with this insect model we could classify the virulence of some strains as low, intermediate or high, in line with the observations in the mammalian model. Therefore, G. mellonella is suitable, and a new alternative, to test virulence of both S. schenckii sensu stricto and S. brasiliensis.
宿主-病原体相互作用的研究对于理解病原体的黏附、定植和组织损伤机制至关重要。这通常通过使用小型哺乳动物（如大鼠、小鼠和豚鼠）进行体内研究来实现。如今，系统性或皮下感染的小鼠模型是分析申克孢子丝菌复合体成员毒力的金标准试验。然而，最近有一些无脊椎动物被用作评估细菌和真菌毒力的替代宿主，其中，大蜡螟幼虫很受欢迎，因为它们易于繁殖，且维持虫群不需要专门的设施。在此，我们评估了使用大蜡螟幼虫来测试狭义申克孢子丝菌和巴西孢子丝菌菌株的毒力，发现感染酵母样细胞而非分生孢子或芽管能够重现感染小鼠模型中产生的毒力数据。此外，利用这个昆虫模型，我们可以将一些菌株的毒力分为低、中或高，这与在哺乳动物模型中的观察结果一致。因此，大蜡螟适合作为测试狭义申克孢子丝菌和巴西孢子丝菌毒力的新的替代模型。
