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Infection and Immunity, January 2008, p. 270-277, Vol. 76, No. 1
0019-9567/08/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/IAI.00955-07
Copyright © 2008, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

The Division of Microbiology, Department of Infectious Medicine, Kurume University School of Medicine, 67 Asahi-machi, Kurume 830-0011, Japan
Received 13 July 2007/ Returned for modification 28 August 2007/ Accepted 16 October 2007
The pathogenesis of Mycoplasma pneumoniae infection is considered to be in part attributable to excessive immune responses. In this study, we investigated whether synthetic lipopeptides of subunit b of F0F1-type ATPase (F0F1-ATPase), NF-
B-activating lipoprotein 1 (N-ALP1), and N-ALP2 (named FAM20, sN-ALP1, and sN-ALP2, respectively) derived from M. pneumoniae induce cytokine and chemokine production and leukocyte infiltration in vivo. Intranasal administration of FAM20 and sN-ALP2 induced infiltration of leukocyte cells and production of chemokines and cytokines in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid, but sN-ALP1 failed to do so. The activity of FAM20 was notably higher than that of sN-ALP2. FAM20 and sN-ALP2 induced tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-
) through Toll-like receptor 2 in mouse peritoneal macrophages. Moreover, in the range of low concentrations of lipopeptides, FAM20 showed relatively high activity of inducing TNF-
in mouse peritoneal macrophages compared to synthetic lipopeptides such as MALP-2 and FSL-1, derived from Mycoplasma fermentans and Mycoplasma salivarium, respectively. These findings indicate that the F0F1-ATPase might be a key molecule in inducing cytokines and chemokines contributing to inflammatory responses during M. pneumoniae infection in vivo.
Published ahead of print on 22 October 2007.
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