Project description:The development of antibiotic tolerance is believed to be a major factor in the lengthy duration of current tuberculosis therapies. In the current study, we have modeled antibiotic tolerance in vitro by exposing Mycobacterium tuberculosis to two distinct stress conditions: progressive hypoxia and nutrient starvation [phosphate-buffered saline (PBS)]. We then studied the bacterial transcriptional response using RNA-seq and employed a bioinformatics approach to identify important transcriptional regulators, which was facilitated by a novel Regulon Enrichment Test (RET). A total of 17 transcription factor (TF) regulons were enriched in the hypoxia gene set and 16 regulons were enriched in the nutrient starvation, with 12 regulons enriched in both conditions. Using the same approach to analyze previously published gene expression datasets, we found that three M. tuberculosis regulons (Rv0023, SigH, and Crp) were commonly induced in both stress conditions and were also among the regulons enriched in our data. These regulators are worthy of further study to determine their potential role in the development and maintenance of antibiotic tolerance in M. tuberculosis following stress exposure.
Project description:In Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the efflux pump, EfpA, plays an essential but uncharacterised role in its physiology and antibiotic tolerance. In this study, an ATc-inducible CRISPR interference (CRISPRi) system was introduced into M. tuberculosis to knock-down the expression of efpA and determine any subsequent effects on the organism. As part of the study, microarray experiments were performed to determine any changes in gene expression caused by efpA repression M. tuberculosis by comparing the transcriptomic profile between ATc-induced efpA knock-down cultures to that of efpA knock-down cultures without ATc-induction.
Project description:Persister cells are a sub-population of all bacterial cultures which exhibit a non-inheritable, multi-drug tolerance when subjected to lethal antibiotic challenge. These persisters arise as a result of metabolic dormancy, and can resume growth subsequent to antibiotic challenge, leading to recalcitrance of bacterial infections. Overproduction of DosP, an oxygen sensing protein with phosphodiesterase activity, increases bacterial persistence. Here we performed a microarray to determine the expression profile induced by DosP as a means to elucidate mechanisms of persister cell formation. dosP was overexpressed in Escherichia coli K-12 BW25113 and compared to the empty vector.
Project description:Persister cells are a sub-population of all bacterial cultures which exhibit a non-inheritable, multi-drug tolerance when subjected to lethal antibiotic challenge. These persisters arise as a result of metabolic dormancy, and can resume growth subsequent to antibiotic challenge, leading to recalcitrance of bacterial infections. Overproduction of DosP, an oxygen sensing protein with phosphodiesterase activity, increases bacterial persistence. Here we performed a microarray to determine the expression profile induced by DosP as a means to elucidate mechanisms of persister cell formation.
Project description:Mycobacterial pathogens adapt to environmental stresses such as nutrient deprivation by entering a non-replicative antibiotic-tolerant state of persistence. Using a biochemically-validated data-driven approach, we identified an adaptive metabolic network underlying the mycobacterial response to starvation in M. tuberculosis, M. bovis BCG and M. smegmatis. All three species show a strong Mg+2-dependence for surviving complete nutrient deprivation, accompanied by a broad phenotypic antibiotic resistance. Multivariate analysis of RNA-seq, metabolic phenotyping and biochemical data revealed substantial metabolic remodelling involving a shift to triacylglycerol utilization with adaptation to the consequent ketoacidosis by upregulation of cytochrome P450s. Paradoxically, the ketosis-driven P450 upregulation generated substantial levels of reactive oxygen species (ROS) yet conferred hypersensitivity to killing by hydrogen peroxide-induced inactivation of the P450s that reduced ROS levels. This emergent property of starvation-induced mycobacterial persistence represents a potentially exploitable vulnerability.
Project description:Kaiser2014 - Salmonella persistence after ciprofloxacin treatment
The model describes the bacterial tolerance to antibiotics. Using a mouse model for Salmonella diarrhea, the authors have found that bacterial persistence occurs in the presence of the antibiotic ciprofloxacin because Salmonella can exist in two different states. One, the fast-growing population that spreads in the host's tissues and the other, slow-growing "persister" population that hide out inside dendritic cells of the host's immune system and cannot be attacked by the antibiotics. However, this can be killed by adding agents that directly stimulate the host's immune defense.
This model is described in the article:
Cecum lymph node dendritic cells harbor slow-growing bacteria phenotypically tolerant to antibiotic treatment.
Kaiser P, Regoes RR, Dolowschiak T, Wotzka SY, Lengefeld J, Slack E, Grant AJ, Ackermann M, Hardt WD.
PLoS Biol. 2014 Feb 18;12(2):e1001793.
Abstract:
In vivo, antibiotics are often much less efficient than ex vivo and relapses can occur. The reasons for poor in vivo activity are still not completely understood. We have studied the fluoroquinolone antibiotic ciprofloxacin in an animal model for complicated Salmonellosis. High-dose ciprofloxacin treatment efficiently reduced pathogen loads in feces and most organs. However, the cecum draining lymph node (cLN), the gut tissue, and the spleen retained surviving bacteria. In cLN, approximately 10%-20% of the bacteria remained viable. These phenotypically tolerant bacteria lodged mostly within CD103⁺CX₃CR1⁻CD11c⁺ dendritic cells, remained genetically susceptible to ciprofloxacin, were sufficient to reinitiate infection after the end of the therapy, and displayed an extremely slow growth rate, as shown by mathematical analysis of infections with mixed inocula and segregative plasmid experiments. The slow growth was sufficient to explain recalcitrance to antibiotics treatment. Therefore, slow-growing antibiotic-tolerant bacteria lodged within dendritic cells can explain poor in vivo antibiotic activity and relapse. Administration of LPS or CpG, known elicitors of innate immune defense, reduced the loads of tolerant bacteria. Thus, manipulating innate immunity may augment the in vivo activity of antibiotics.
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Project description:The stringent response, involving the regulatory molecules inorganic polyphosphate (poly P) and (p)ppGpp, is believed to mediate Mycobacterium tuberculosis persistence. In this study, we identified a novel exopolyphosphatase responsible for poly P hydrolysis. Using two different poly P-accumulating M. tuberculosis recombinant strains, we found that increased poly P content drives the organisms into early growth arrest, and contributes to tolerance to the cell wall-active agent isoniazid, increased resistance to stress conditions, and improved survival in macrophages. Transcriptomic and metabolomics analysis revealed metabolic downshift manifested by reduced expression of the transcriptional and translational machinery, and shift from utilization of glucose as a carbon source. In summary, regulation of the poly P balance is critical for persister formation in M. tuberculosis. The transcriptome of poly P accumulation strains, Rv1026 knock-down and ppk1 knock-in were compared to empty vector strains by RNA-seq.
Project description:Staphylococcus aureus is responsible for a substantial number of invasive infections globally each year. These infections are problematic because they are frequently recalcitrant to antibiotic treatment. Antibiotic tolerance, the ability of bacteria to persist despite normally lethal doses of antibiotics, contributes to antibiotic treatment failure in S. aureus infections. To understand how antibiotic tolerance is induced, S. aureus biofilms exposed to multiple anti-staphylococcal antibiotics were examined using both quantitative proteomics and transposon sequencing. These screens indicated that arginine metabolism is involved in antibiotic tolerance within a biofilm and led to the hypothesis that depletion of arginine within S. aureus communities can induce antibiotic tolerance. Consistent with this hypothesis, inactivation of argH, the final gene in the arginine synthesis pathway, induces antibiotic tolerance. Arginine restriction was found to induce antibiotic tolerance via inhibition of protein synthesis. In a mouse skin infection model, an argH mutant has enhanced ability to survive antibiotic treatment with vancomycin, highlighting the relationship between arginine metabolism and antibiotic tolerance during S. aureus infection. Uncovering this link between arginine metabolism and antibiotic tolerance has the potential to open new therapeutic avenues targeting previously recalcitrant S. aureus infections.
Project description:Understanding how M. tuberculosis survives during antibiotic treatment is necessary to rationally devise more effective tuberculosis chemotherapy regimens. Using genome-wide mutant fitness profiling and the mouse model of TB, we identified genes that alter antibiotic efficacy specifically in the infection environment.
Project description:The stringent response, involving the regulatory molecules inorganic polyphosphate (poly P) and (p)ppGpp, is believed to mediate Mycobacterium tuberculosis persistence. In this study, we identified a novel exopolyphosphatase responsible for poly P hydrolysis. Using two different poly P-accumulating M. tuberculosis recombinant strains, we found that increased poly P content drives the organisms into early growth arrest, and contributes to tolerance to the cell wall-active agent isoniazid, increased resistance to stress conditions, and improved survival in macrophages. Transcriptomic and metabolomics analysis revealed metabolic downshift manifested by reduced expression of the transcriptional and translational machinery, and shift from utilization of glucose as a carbon source. In summary, regulation of the poly P balance is critical for persister formation in M. tuberculosis.