CINDEFI (UNLP-CONICET), Facultad de Ciencias Exactas, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, La Plata, Argentina.
PLoS One. 2023 Nov 27;18(11):e0291331. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0291331. eCollection 2023.
B. parapertussis is one of the etiological agents of whooping cough. Once inhaled, the bacteria bind to the respiratory epithelium and start the infection. Little is known about this first step of host colonization and the role of the human airway epithelial barrier on B. parapertussis infection. We here investigated the outcome of the interaction of B. parapertussis with a polarized monolayer of respiratory epithelial cells. Our results show that B. parapertussis preferentially attaches to the intercellular boundaries, and causes the disruption of the tight junction integrity through the action of adenylate cyclase toxin (CyaA). We further found evidence indicating that this disruption enables the bacterial access to components of the basolateral membrane of epithelial cells to which B. parapertussis efficiently attaches and gains access to the intracellular location, where it can survive and eventually spread back into the extracellular environment. Altogether, these results suggest that the adenylate cyclase toxin enables B. parapertussis to overcome the epithelial barrier and eventually establish a niche of persistence within the respiratory epithelial cells.
B. 副百日咳鲍特菌是百日咳的病原体之一。细菌一旦被吸入，就会与呼吸道上皮结合并开始感染。目前对于宿主定植的这第一步以及人类气道上皮屏障在 B. 副百日咳鲍特菌感染中的作用知之甚少。我们在此研究了 B. 副百日咳鲍特菌与呼吸道上皮细胞的极化单层相互作用的结果。我们的结果表明，B. 副百日咳鲍特菌优先附着在细胞间边界上，并通过腺苷酸环化酶毒素 (CyaA) 的作用破坏紧密连接的完整性。我们进一步发现的证据表明，这种破坏使细菌能够接触到上皮细胞基底外侧膜的成分，B. 副百日咳鲍特菌能够有效地附着在这些成分上，并进入细胞内位置，在那里它可以存活并最终扩散回细胞外环境。总的来说，这些结果表明，腺苷酸环化酶毒素使 B. 副百日咳鲍特菌能够克服上皮屏障，最终在呼吸道上皮细胞内建立一个持续存在的小生境。
