Project description:Clostridium perfringens is an anaerobic, gram-positive, spore-forming bacterium spread throughout the environment. This bacterium is a common agent in the gastrointestinal tracts of healthy human beings and other mammals. Simultaneously, this agent is one of the most significant producers of toxins among all known bacteria. This expressive toxicity is due to the bacterium’s ability collectively to produce different protein toxins and/or enzymes with diverse modes of action. The present study uses currently developed targeted proteomic methods for the simultaneous detection of selected C. perfringens protein toxins. The method was applied in different kinds of environmental matrices and was used to analyze toxins production in a set of collection strains.
2019-03-25 | PXD012528 | Pride
Project description:Clostridium perfringens from Gas gangrene
Project description:In both humans and animals, Clostridium perfringens is an important cause of histotoxic infections and diseases originating in the intestines, such as enteritis and enterotoxemia. The virulence of this Gram-positive, anaerobic bacterium is heavily dependent upon its prolific toxin-producing ability. Many of the ?16 toxins produced by C. perfringens are encoded by large plasmids that range in size from ?45 kb to ?140 kb. These plasmid-encoded toxins are often closely associated with mobile elements. A C. perfringens strain can carry up to three different toxin plasmids, with a single plasmid carrying up to three distinct toxin genes. Molecular Koch's postulate analyses have established the importance of several plasmid-encoded toxins when C. perfringens disease strains cause enteritis or enterotoxemias. Many toxin plasmids are closely related, suggesting a common evolutionary origin. In particular, most toxin plasmids and some antibiotic resistance plasmids of C. perfringens share an ?35-kb region containing a Tn916-related conjugation locus named tcp (transfer of clostridial plasmids). This tcp locus can mediate highly efficient conjugative transfer of these toxin or resistance plasmids. For example, conjugative transfer of a toxin plasmid from an infecting strain to C. perfringens normal intestinal flora strains may help to amplify and prolong an infection. Therefore, the presence of toxin genes on conjugative plasmids, particularly in association with insertion sequences that may mobilize these toxin genes, likely provides C. perfringens with considerable virulence plasticity and adaptability when it causes diseases originating in the gastrointestinal tract.