| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
,
Center for Biomedical Microbiology, BioCentrum-DTU, Technical University of Denmark, Lyngby, Denmark,1 Department of Clinical Microbiology, Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen, Denmark2
Received 17 July 2006/ Returned for modification 24 August 2006/ Accepted 2 October 2006
Escherichia coli is a versatile pathogen causing millions of infections in humans every year. This bacterium can form multicellular aggregates when it expresses a self-associating protein, antigen 43 (Ag43), on its surface. We have discovered that Ag43-expressing E. coli cells are efficiently taken up by human defense cells, polymorphonuclear neutrophils (PMNs), in an opsonin-independent manner. Surprisingly, the phagocytosed bacteria were not immediately killed but resided as tight aggregates within the PMNs. Our observations indicate that Ag43-mediated uptake and survival in PMNs constitute a mechanism to subvert one of the primary defense mechanisms of the human body.
Published ahead of print on 9 October 2006.
Supplemental material for this article may be found at http://iai.asm.org/.
This article has been cited by other articles:
| J. Bacteriol. | J. Virol. | Eukaryot. Cell |
|---|
| Microbiol. Mol. Biol. Rev. | Clin. Vaccine Immunol. | All ASM Journals |
|---|