Escherichia coli in chronic inflammatory bowel diseases: An update on adherent invasive Escherichia coli pathogenicity

Cellular and Molecular Connections between Autophagy and Inflammation

Autophagy is an intracellular catabolic pathway essential for the recycling of proteins and larger substrates such as aggregates, apoptotic corpses, or long-lived and superfluous organelles whose accumulation could be toxic for cells. Because of its unique feature to engulf part of cytoplasm in double-membrane cup-shaped structures, which further fuses with lysosomes, autophagy is also involved in the elimination of host cell invaders and takes an active part of the innate and adaptive immune response. Its pivotal role in maintenance of the inflammatory balance makes dysfunctions of the autophagy process having important pathological consequences. Indeed, defects in autophagy are associated with a wide range of human diseases including metabolic disorders (diabetes and obesity), inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), and cancer. In this review, we will focus on interrelations that exist between inflammation and autophagy. We will discuss in particular how mediators of inflammation can regulate autophagy activity and, conversely, how autophagy shapes the inflammatory response. Impact of genetic polymorphisms in autophagy-related gene on inflammatory bowel disease will be also discussed.

The microbiota in inflammatory bowel disease

This review explores our current understanding of the complex interaction between environmental risk factors, genetic traits and the development of inflammatory bowel disease. The primacy of environmental risk factors is illustrated by the rapid increase in the incidence of the disease worldwide. We discuss how the gut microbiota is the proximate environmental risk factor for subsequent development of inflammatory bowel disease. The evolving fields of virome and mycobiome studies will further our understanding of the full potential of the gut microbiota in disease pathogenesis. Manipulating the gut microbiota is a promising therapeutic avenue.

Multidrug efflux pumps from Enterobacteriaceae, Vibrio cholerae and Staphylococcus aureus bacterial food pathogens

Foodborne illnesses caused by bacterial microorganisms are common worldwide and constitute a serious public health concern. In particular, microorganisms belonging to the Enterobacteriaceae and Vibrionaceae families of Gram-negative bacteria, and to the Staphylococcus genus of Gram-positive bacteria are important causative agents of food poisoning and infection in the gastrointestinal tract of humans. Recently, variants of these bacteria have developed resistance to medically important chemotherapeutic agents. Multidrug resistant Escherichia coli, Salmonella enterica, Vibrio cholerae, Enterobacter spp., and Staphylococcus aureus are becoming increasingly recalcitrant to clinical treatment in human patients. Of the various bacterial resistance mechanisms against antimicrobial agents, multidrug efflux pumps comprise a major cause of multiple drug resistance. These multidrug efflux pump systems reside in the biological membrane of the bacteria and actively extrude antimicrobial agents from bacterial cells. This review article summarizes the evolution of these bacterial drug efflux pump systems from a molecular biological standpoint and provides a framework for future work aimed at reducing the conditions that foster dissemination of these multidrug resistant causative agents through human populations.