Infect Immun, July 1998, p. 3480-3484, Vol. 66, No. 7
Department of Pathology, Case Western Reserve
University, Cleveland, Ohio 44106,1 and
Rocky Mountain Laboratories, NIAID, National Institutes of
Health, Hamilton, Montana 598402
Received 7 November 1997/Returned for modification 23 December
1997/Accepted 24 March 1998
Escherichia coli heat-labile enterotoxin (LT) and
cholera toxin (CT) were found to inhibit intracellular antigen
processing. Processing was not inhibited by mutant LT with attenuated
ADP-ribosyltransferase activity, CT B or LT B subunit, which enhanced
presentation of preexisting cell surface peptide-class II major
histocompatibility complex complexes. Inhibition of antigen processing
correlated with A subunit ADP-ribosyltransferase activity.
Escherichia coli
heat-labile enterotoxin (LT) and cholera toxin (CT) are related
ADP-ribosylating toxins with five identical B subunits that bind to
cell surface ganglioside receptors and an enzymatically active A
subunit that enters the cell and catalyzes the ADP-ribosylation of
guanine nucleotide binding proteins of the adenylate cyclase complex,
causing constitutive activation of adenylate cyclase and increased
intracellular cyclic AMP (cAMP).
LT and CT are potent mucosal adjuvants (7, 8, 12, 20, 22, 23, 29,
31-33). Some degree of A subunit enzymatic activity is required
for oral adjuvant function (20, 23, 32, 33). While
ADP-ribosyltransferase activity enhances adjuvanticity, it also confers
toxicity. For an optimal adjuvant, reduced toxicity would be desirable,
and mutant LT (6, 9-11, 15, 17, 21, 26, 34) and CT (5,
35) molecules have been constructed with altered A subunits,
reduced ADP ribosylation activity, and reduced toxicity, yet with
maintained adjuvant function (9-11, 13, 25, 26, 35).
Mutation studies with LT revealed that residues at positions 7, 110, and 112 of LT A subunit (LTA) are important for ADP-ribosyltransferase
activity (6, 21, 28), with Glu-112 providing a catalytic
role. A conservative mutation (Asp to Glu) at position 112 produced a
mutant toxin, rLT-E112D, with substantially reduced (<2% of wild
type) but detectable ADP-ribosyltransferase activity (6).
CT and LT affect many components of immune responses, including antigen
presentation (3, 4, 18), with inhibitory as well as
enhancing effects. We previously showed that CT enhances macrophage
presentation of cell surface peptide-class II major histocompatibility
complex (MHC-II) complexes to T cells but inhibits intracellular
antigen processing (24). However, the effects of LT have not
been similarly investigated. Furthermore, mutant LT molecules provide
tools to determine the role of A subunit enzymatic activity in
immunomodulation and toxicity.
The present study was designed to investigate the effects of LT and
mutant LT molecules on antigen processing and presentation by
macrophages. In particular, we examined the effects of LT on the
processing and presentation of a model antigen expressed in bacteria (a
system to which LT has natural relevance) by using Escherichia
coli strain HB101 expressing the Crl-HEL fusion protein (HB101.Crl-HEL) (27), which contains the HEL(48-61) epitope. LT, the mutant toxin rLT-E112D, and recombinant LTB (rLTB) (Table 1) were prepared as described previously
(6, 15). rLTB was produced by using a vector encoding LTB
and the A2 fragment of LT (LTA2), but subsequent chromatographic
purification produced isolated rLTB, as revealed by sodium dodecyl
sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis analysis. Trypsin-cleaved LT
was produced as described previously (15) and analyzed by
sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. Highly
purified CT was purchased from List Biologicals (Campbell, Calif.).
Recombinant CTB (rCTB) was a gift from Jan Holmgren (University of
Gøteborg, Gøteborg, Sweden) and was prepared as described previously
(30).
0019-9567/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
Inhibition of Class II Major Histocompatibility
Complex Antigen Processing by Escherichia coli Heat-Labile
Enterotoxin Requires an Enzymatically Active A Subunit
and
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TABLE 1.
Toxin composition and enzymatic activity
LT inhibits macrophage processing of HB101.Crl-HEL but not presentation of preexisting peptide-MHC-II complexes. To determine the impact of LT on antigen processing, activated Listeria-elicited macrophages were obtained from CBA/J mice (H-2k) (16), plated at 2 × 105 cells/well in 96-well microtiter plates, washed to remove nonadherent cells, and incubated overnight with LT. The cells were then washed, incubated with viable E. coli HB101.Crl-HEL for 2 h to allow antigen processing, fixed in 1% paraformaldehyde, washed, and then incubated with 3A9 T hybridoma cells, as previously described (24). LT inhibited the processing of HB101.Crl-HEL for presentation to 3A9 cells at doses of 1 to 10 µg of LT per ml (data not shown; see below). Although cleavage of LTA into the A1 and A2 fragments may be required for LT enzymatic activity (14), we observed that trypsin-cleaved LT and intact LT had similar effects on antigen processing (although trypsin cleavage slightly enhanced the magnitude of inhibition). LT may be cleaved by cell-derived proteases during uptake into cells, making prior in vitro cleavage unnecessary (19). Subsequent studies were done with uncleaved LT at 1 µg/ml.
In order to assess the stage of antigen processing and presentation that was affected by LT, macrophages were sequentially exposed to LT and antigen in various orders. In the first protocol, macrophages were incubated with LT prior to incubation with viable HB101.Crl-HEL. In the second protocol, macrophages were first incubated with HB101.Crl-HEL to allow unaltered bacterial antigen processing, production of peptide-MHC-II complexes, and expression of these complexes on the cell surface. The macrophages were then washed and incubated with or without LT. The inhibitory effects observed when the antigen incubation followed LT exposure (Fig. 1A) were not observed when macrophages were first incubated with antigen and then exposed to LT (Fig. 1B). These results indicate that LT inhibited an intracellular stage of bacterial antigen processing, prior to expression of peptide-MHC-II complexes on the cell surface, since the presentation of complexes that were previously expressed on the cell surface was not altered by LT.
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Inhibition of HB101.Crl-HEL processing by LT is not due to inhibition of antigen catabolism. Additional studies assessed whether the inhibition of antigen processing by LT was due to a decrease in the ability of macrophages to internalize and catabolize bacteria and their antigens. Macrophages were incubated overnight with or without LT or CT. The ability of the macrophages to internalize and degrade 125I-labeled HB101.Crl-HEL was then assessed (Fig. 2). LT produced no consistent change in bacterial uptake and catabolism (minimal decreases were observed in some experiments), and CT produced only slight decreases in bacterial uptake and catabolism (Fig. 2). Thus, LT had little or no effect on bacterial uptake and catabolism, indicating that other aspects of the antigen-processing pathway were affected by LT.
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LTA activity is necessary for inhibition of intracellular antigen processing, whereas LTB enhances the presentation of cell surface peptide-MHC-II complexes. Macrophages that were treated overnight with rLTB or rCTB showed enhanced presentation of antigens that were subsequently added, in contrast to the inhibition seen with LT or CT holotoxins (Fig. 3A). rLTB produced less enhancement than rCTB. In addition, rLTB and rCTB enhanced the presentation of synthetic HEL(48-61) peptide (data not shown), indicating that the enhancement involved increased recognition of peptide-MHC-II complexes present at the cell surface, as opposed to increased intracellular processing. The mechanism for this is unclear, but it does not involve increased MHC-II expression, which remained unchanged as determined by flow cytometry analysis (data not shown), and it may be caused by changes in cell surface adhesion or costimulator molecules (1). We conclude that the A subunit of LT is required for inhibition of antigen processing but not for enhancement of surface complex presentation.
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ADP-ribosyltransferase activity is necessary for the inhibition of antigen processing mediated by LT. rLT-E112D, an LT holotoxin containing a point mutation in LTA, was previously shown to have <2% of wild-type ADP-ribosyltransferase activity (6). In contrast to wild-type LT, rLT-E112D did not inhibit antigen processing (Fig. 3B). Thus, inhibition of antigen processing by LT requires significant levels of ADP-ribosylation activity. In fact, rLT-E112D produced a slight enhancement of antigen processing (Fig. 3B), possibly due to the effects of the B subunit of this recombinant toxin in the absence of sufficient A subunit activity to produce inhibition.
Effect of LT and mutant LT on intracellular cAMP levels. Since the result of toxin-mediated ADP-ribosylation of Gs proteins is the accumulation of intracellular cAMP, the ability of LT and related molecules to elevate cAMP levels in macrophages was determined. CT caused transient increases of cAMP to high levels, with initial rises occurring within 0.5 h, a peak in cAMP levels at 1 to 2 h, and return of cAMP levels to normal levels by 19 h (Fig. 4). LT also increased intracellular cAMP but to lower levels and with slower kinetics of both onset (after 1 h) and decay (cAMP levels were still elevated at 19 h). Trypsin-cleaved LT increased cAMP more rapidly and to higher levels than LT, with levels approaching but not equaling those seen with CT within 0 to 2 h. This suggests that lack of prior cleavage of the A subunit may be important in the delayed kinetics and lower magnitude of the LT effect. Trypsin-cleaved LT, like LT, produced a longer-lasting elevation of cAMP than that seen with CT, with elevation persisting at 19 h. rLT-E112D produced little or no elevation of cAMP before 4 h but consistently produced low-level cAMP elevation at 19 h. As predicted, rLTB and rCTB produced no significant elevation of cAMP.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS |
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This work was supported in part by NIH grants AI34343, AI35726, and CA70149 to C.H. and AI40701 to J.N. Milita Matousek was supported by NIH training grant AI-07427.
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FOOTNOTES |
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* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Institute of Pathology, Case Western Reserve University, 2085 Adelbert Rd., Cleveland, OH 44106. Phone: (216) 368-4711. Fax: (216) 368-0495. E-mail: cvh3{at}po.cwru.edu.
Present address: Antigen Discovery and Evaluation, RIBI Immunochem
Research, Hamilton, MT 59840.
Editor: S. H. E. Kaufmann
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