The influence of lipopolysaccharide on the transformation efficiency of Klebsiella pneumoniae

1989 ◽  
Vol 35 (7) ◽  
pp. 735-737 ◽  
Author(s):  
Silvia Camprubí ◽  
Miquel Regué ◽  
Juán Tomás

The presence of O antigen of the lipopolysaccharide on Klebsiella pneumoniae is responsible for the low transformation frequencies observed. No significant influence of capsular polysaccharide could be observed. This phenomenon was independent of the transformation procedure and plasmid size.Key words: lipopolysaccharide, capsular polysaccharide, transformation, Klebsiella pneumoniae.

2012 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tarek A. Ahmad ◽  
Medhat Haroun ◽  
Ahmed A. Hussein ◽  
El Sayed H. El Ashry ◽  
Laila H. El-Sayed

<em>Klebsiella pneumoniae</em> is a major cause of nosocomial pneumonia, septicemia and urinary tract infections, especially in newborns, blood cancer patients, and other immunocompromised candidates. The control of <em>K. pneumoniae</em> is a complicated issue due to its tight pathogenesis. Immuno-prophylactic preparations, especially those directed toward the <em>bacterium</em> O-antigen, showed to be the most successful way to prevent the infection incidence. However, all previously proposed preparations were either of limited spectrum or non-maternal, and hence not targeting the main <em>Klebsiella</em> patients. Moreover, all preparations were directed only to prevent the respiratory diseases due to that pathogen. This article addresses the development of a method originally used to purify the non-capsular bacterial- endotoxins, as a new and easy method for vaccine production against <em>K. pneumoniae</em>. The application of this method was preceded by a biotechnological control of capsular polysaccharide production in <em>K. pneumoniae</em>. The new produced natural conjugate between the bacterial O-antigen and its outer membrane proteins was evaluated by physicochemical and immunological methods to investigate its purity, integrity, safety and immunogenicity. It showed to be pure, stable, safe for use, and able to elicit a protective immunoglobulin titer against different <em>Klebsiella</em> infections. This immune-response proved to be transferable to the offspring of the vaccinated experimental rabbits via placenta.


1999 ◽  
Vol 67 (2) ◽  
pp. 664-669 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Domenico ◽  
J. M. Tomas ◽  
S. Merino ◽  
X. Rubires ◽  
Burke A. Cunha

ABSTRACT The bacterial capsule is an important virulence determinant in animal and plant disease. Bacterial capsule and slime can be inhibited by bismuth compounds, especially when complexed with lipophilic thiol chelators. Bismuth dimercaprol (BisBAL) at 1 ppm of Bi3+repressed Klebsiella pneumoniae capsule expression in defined medium by nearly 90%, which exposed subsurface structures. The phagocytic index for BisBAL-treated bacteria increased from <10 to 360 bacteria per 100 neutrophils in the presence of complement and anticapsular or anti-O antigen antiserum. BisBAL treatment also enhanced the reactivity of monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) specific for the O1-antigen lipopolysaccharide (LPS) or the LPS core in a dose-dependent manner as indicated by the results of enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays. When anti-O1 MAb was used, the reactivity increased significantly for fully encapsulated O1:K1 or O1:K2 cells but not for O1:K− cells. Deposition of C3b also increased significantly for BisBAL-treated O1:K1 or O1:K2 cells but not for O1:K− cells. Survival of a serum-sensitive strain was <0.1% when nonimmune human serum absorbed with O1:K1 cells was used and 107% when BisBAL-treated cells were used for absorption. Outer membrane proteins were also more accessible on the surface of K. pneumoniae after BisBAL treatment. Thus, at subinhibitory levels, BisBAL inhibited capsule expression, which promoted phagocytosis, enhanced the reactivity of specific antibodies for LPS O antigen, LPS core epitopes, or outer-membrane proteins, and enhanced complement interaction with encapsulated K. pneumoniae. By unmasking bacterial surface structures and enhancing the immune system reactivity to bacteria, bismuth thiols may prove useful as adjuncts for vaccination.


2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (18) ◽  
pp. 6572
Author(s):  
Daria Artyszuk ◽  
Radosław Izdebski ◽  
Anna Maciejewska ◽  
Marta Kaszowska ◽  
Aleksandra Herud ◽  
...  

Klebsiella pneumoniae is a nosocomial pathogen, pointed out by the World Helth Organisation (WHO) as “critical” regarding the highly limited options of treatment. Lipopolysaccharide (LPS, O-antigen) and capsular polysaccharide (K-antigen) are its virulence factors and surface antigens, determining O- and K-serotypes and encoded by O- or K-loci. They are promising targets for antibody-based therapies (vaccines and passive immunization) as an alternative to antibiotics. To make such immunotherapy effective, knowledge about O/K-antigen structures, drift, and distribution among clinical isolates is needed. At present, the structural analysis of O-antigens is efficiently supported by bioinformatics. O- and K-loci-based genotyping by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) or whole genome sequencing WGS has been proposed as a diagnostic tool, including the Kaptive tool available in the public domain. We analyzed discrepancies for O2 serotyping between Kaptive-based predictions (O2 variant 2 serotype) and the actual phenotype (O2 variant 1) for two K. pneumoniae clinical isolates. Identified length discrepancies from the reference O-locus resulted from insertion sequences (ISs) within rfb regions of the O-loci. In silico analysis of 8130 O1 and O2 genomes available in public databases indicated a broader distribution of ISs in rfbs that may influence the actual O-antigen structure. Our results show that current high-throughput genotyping algorithms need to be further refined to consider the effects of ISs on the LPS O-serotype.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 335
Author(s):  
Novaria Sari Dewi Panjaitan ◽  
Yu-Tze Horng ◽  
Chih-Ching Chien ◽  
Hung-Chi Yang ◽  
Ren-In You ◽  
...  

Capsular polysaccharide (CPS) is a crucial virulence factor for Klebsiella pneumoniae infection. We demonstrated an association of CPS production with two phosphoenolpyruvate:carbohydrate phosphotransferase systems (PTSs). Deficiency of crr, encoding enzyme IIA of PTS, in K. pneumoniae enhanced the transcriptional activities of galF, wzi and gnd, which are in the cps gene cluster, leading to high CPS production. A crr mutant exhibited a higher survival rate in 1% hydrogen peroxide than the wild-type. The crr mutant showed less sensitivity to engulfment by macrophage (RAW 264.7) than the wild-type by observing the intracellular bacteria using confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) and by calculating the colony-forming units (CFU) of intracellular bacteria. After long-term incubation, the survival rate of the intracellular crr mutant was higher than that of the wild-type. Deficiency of crr enhanced the transcriptional activities of etcABC which encodes another putative enzyme II complex of a PTS. Deletion of etcABC in the crr mutant reduced CPS production and the transcriptional activities of galF compared to those of the crr mutant. These results indicated that one PTS component, Crr, represses CPS production by repressing another PTS component, EtcABC, in K. pneumoniae. In addition, PTS plays a role in bacterial resistance to macrophage phagocytosis.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 762
Author(s):  
Lucia Henrici De Angelis ◽  
Noemi Poerio ◽  
Vincenzo Di Pilato ◽  
Federica De Santis ◽  
Alberto Antonelli ◽  
...  

Phage therapy is now reconsidered with interest in the treatment of bacterial infections. A major piece of information for this application is the definition of the molecular targets exploited by phages to infect bacteria. Here, the genetic basis of resistance to the lytic phage φBO1E by its susceptible host Klebsiella pneumoniae KKBO-1 has been investigated. KKBO-1 phage-resistant mutants were obtained by infection at high multiplicity. One mutant, designated BO-FR-1, was selected for subsequent experiments, including virulence assessment in a Galleria mellonella infection model and characterization by whole-genome sequencing. Infection with BO-FR-1 was associated with a significantly lower mortality when compared to that of the parental strain. The BO-FR-1 genome differed from KKBO-1 by a single nonsense mutation into the wbaP gene, which encodes a glycosyltransferase involved in the first step of the biosynthesis of the capsular polysaccharide (CPS). Phage susceptibility was restored when BO-FR-1 was complemented with the constitutive wbaP gene. Our results demonstrated that φBO1E infects KKBO-1 targeting the bacterial CPS. Interestingly, BO-FR-1 was less virulent than the parental strain, suggesting that in the context of the interplay among phage, bacterial pathogen and host, the emergence of phage resistance may be beneficial for the host.


PLoS ONE ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 7 (10) ◽  
pp. e46783 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tzu-Lung Lin ◽  
Feng-Ling Yang ◽  
An-Suei Yang ◽  
Hung-Pin Peng ◽  
Tsung-Lin Li ◽  
...  

1988 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 141-147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Juan M. Tomas ◽  
Silvia Camprubi ◽  
Paul Williams

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document