An animal model for the study of neurotoxicity of bacterial products and application of the model to demonstrate that Shiga toxin and lipopolysaccharide cooperate in inducing neurologic disorders.

An approach for studying neurotoxicity of bacterial products is presented. Pentylenetetrazol, a convulsant drug, was injected into mice, and increased sensitivity to pentylenetetrazol was used as an indicator of neurotoxicity. The preinjection of sonicates of Shigella dysenteriae 60R or Escherichia coli H30 (producing Shiga toxin or Shiga-like toxin I, respectively) enhanced the response of mice to pentylenetetrazol within 6 h. This was indicated by a higher mean convulsion score, increased number of mice responding with convulsions, and induction of seizures in animals pretreated with a subepileptic dose of pentylenetetrazol. Preinjection of purified Shiga toxin significantly changed the response to pentylenetetrazol only when coadministered with bacterial lipopolysaccharide (LPS); mean convulsion scores were 1.6 and 0.9 for the Shiga toxin-LPS group and controls, respectively. LPS alone did not affect sensitivity to pentylenetetrazol. These results suggest that Shiga toxin and LPS together induce neurologic disorders early in the course of infection.