1
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McVey DG, Andreadi C, Gong P, Stanczyk PJ, Solomon CU, Turner L, Yan L, Chen R, Cao J, Nelson CP, Thompson JR, Yu H, Webb TR, Samani NJ, Ye S. Genetic influence on vascular smooth muscle cell apoptosis. Cell Death Dis 2024; 15:402. [PMID: 38851795 PMCID: PMC11162461 DOI: 10.1038/s41419-024-06799-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/02/2023] [Revised: 05/27/2024] [Accepted: 05/31/2024] [Indexed: 06/10/2024]
Abstract
Vascular smooth muscle cell (VSMC) proliferation, migration, and apoptosis play important roles in many physiological processes and pathological conditions. To identify genetic influences on VSMC behavior, we measured these traits and undertook genome-wide association studies in primary umbilical artery-derived VSMCs from >2000 individuals. Although there were no genome-wide significant associations for VSMC proliferation or migration, genetic variants at two genomic loci (7p15.3 and 7q32.3) showed highly significant associations with VSMC apoptosis (P = 1.95 × 10-13 and P = 7.47 × 10-9, respectively). The lead variant at the 7p51.3 locus was associated with increased expression of the GSDME and PALS2 genes in VSMCs. Knockdown of GSDME or PALS2 in VSMCs attenuated apoptotic cell death. A protein co-immunoprecipitation assay indicated that GSDME complexed with PALS2. PALS2 knockdown attenuated activated caspase-3 and GSDME fragmentation, whilst GSDME knockdown also reduced activated caspase-3. These findings provide new insights into the genetic regulation of VSMC apoptosis, with potential utility for therapeutic development.
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Affiliation(s)
- David G McVey
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Catherine Andreadi
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Peng Gong
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Paulina J Stanczyk
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Charles U Solomon
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Lenka Turner
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Liu Yan
- Cardiovascular-Metabolic Disease Translational Research Programme, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of, Singapore, Singapore
| | - Runji Chen
- Shantou University Medical College, Shantou, China
| | - Junjun Cao
- Shantou University Medical College, Shantou, China
| | - Christopher P Nelson
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - John R Thompson
- Department of Health Sciences, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Haojie Yu
- Cardiovascular-Metabolic Disease Translational Research Programme, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of, Singapore, Singapore
| | - Tom R Webb
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Nilesh J Samani
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK
| | - Shu Ye
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and National Institute for Health Research Leicester Biomedical Research Centre, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK.
- Cardiovascular-Metabolic Disease Translational Research Programme, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of, Singapore, Singapore.
- Shantou University Medical College, Shantou, China.
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2
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Liu J, Zhang H. Zinc Finger and BTB Domain-Containing 20: A Newly Emerging Player in Pathogenesis and Development of Human Cancers. Biomolecules 2024; 14:192. [PMID: 38397429 PMCID: PMC10887282 DOI: 10.3390/biom14020192] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/12/2024] [Revised: 01/30/2024] [Accepted: 02/02/2024] [Indexed: 02/25/2024] Open
Abstract
Zinc finger and BTB domain-containing 20 (ZBTB20), which was initially identified in human dendritic cells, belongs to a family of transcription factors (TFs) with an N-terminal BTB domain and one or more C-terminal DNA-binding zinc finger domains. Under physiological conditions, ZBTB20 acts as a transcriptional repressor in cellular development and differentiation, metabolism, and innate immunity. Interestingly, multiple lines of evidence from mice and human systems have revealed the importance of ZBTB20 in the pathogenesis and development of cancers. ZBTB20 is not only a hotspot of genetic variation or fusion in many types of human cancers, but also a key TF or intermediator involving in the dysregulation of cancer cells. Given the diverse functions of ZBTB20 in both health and disease, we herein summarize the structure and physiological roles of ZBTB20, with an emphasis on the latest findings on tumorigenesis and cancer progression.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Han Zhang
- Institute of Medical Biology, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Kunming 650118, China;
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3
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Nehar-Belaid D, Sokolowski M, Ravichandran S, Banchereau J, Chaussabel D, Ucar D. Baseline immune states (BIS) associated with vaccine responsiveness and factors that shape the BIS. Semin Immunol 2023; 70:101842. [PMID: 37717525 DOI: 10.1016/j.smim.2023.101842] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/30/2023] [Accepted: 09/11/2023] [Indexed: 09/19/2023]
Abstract
Vaccines are among the greatest inventions in medicine, leading to the elimination or control of numerous diseases, including smallpox, polio, measles, rubella, and, most recently, COVID-19. Yet, the effectiveness of vaccines varies among individuals. In fact, while some recipients mount a robust response to vaccination that protects them from the disease, others fail to respond. Multiple clinical and epidemiological factors contribute to this heterogeneity in responsiveness. Systems immunology studies fueled by advances in single-cell biology have been instrumental in uncovering pre-vaccination immune cell types and genomic features (i.e., the baseline immune state, BIS) that have been associated with vaccine responsiveness. Here, we review clinical factors that shape the BIS, and the characteristics of the BIS associated with responsiveness to frequently studied vaccines (i.e., influenza, COVID-19, bacterial pneumonia, malaria). Finally, we discuss potential strategies to enhance vaccine responsiveness in high-risk groups, focusing specifically on older adults.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Mark Sokolowski
- The Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine, Farmington, CT 06030, USA
| | | | | | - Damien Chaussabel
- The Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine, Farmington, CT 06030, USA
| | - Duygu Ucar
- The Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine, Farmington, CT 06030, USA; Institute for Systems Genomics, University of Connecticut Health Center, Farmington, CT, USA.
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4
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Häder A, Schäuble S, Gehlen J, Thielemann N, Buerfent BC, Schüller V, Hess T, Wolf T, Schröder J, Weber M, Hünniger K, Löffler J, Vylkova S, Panagiotou G, Schumacher J, Kurzai O. Pathogen-specific innate immune response patterns are distinctly affected by genetic diversity. Nat Commun 2023; 14:3239. [PMID: 37277347 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-38994-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/14/2021] [Accepted: 05/25/2023] [Indexed: 06/07/2023] Open
Abstract
Innate immune responses vary by pathogen and host genetics. We analyze quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) and transcriptomes of monocytes from 215 individuals stimulated by fungal, Gram-negative or Gram-positive bacterial pathogens. We identify conserved monocyte responses to bacterial pathogens and a distinct antifungal response. These include 745 response eQTLs (reQTLs) and corresponding genes with pathogen-specific effects, which we find first in samples of male donors and subsequently confirm for selected reQTLs in females. reQTLs affect predominantly upregulated genes that regulate immune response via e.g., NOD-like, C-type lectin, Toll-like and complement receptor-signaling pathways. Hence, reQTLs provide a functional explanation for individual differences in innate response patterns. Our identified reQTLs are also associated with cancer, autoimmunity, inflammatory and infectious diseases as shown by external genome-wide association studies. Thus, reQTLs help to explain interindividual variation in immune response to infection and provide candidate genes for variants associated with a range of diseases.
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Affiliation(s)
- Antje Häder
- Research Group Fungal Septomics, Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany
| | - Sascha Schäuble
- Department of Microbiome Dynamics, Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany
| | - Jan Gehlen
- Institute of Human Genetics, Philipps University of Marburg, 35033, Marburg, Germany
| | - Nadja Thielemann
- Institute for Hygiene and Microbiology, Julius Maximilians University of Wuerzburg, 97080, Wuerzburg, Germany
| | - Benedikt C Buerfent
- Institute of Human Genetics, Philipps University of Marburg, 35033, Marburg, Germany
- Institute of Human Genetics, University of Bonn, School of Medicine & University Hospital Bonn, 53127, Bonn, Germany
| | - Vitalia Schüller
- Institute of Human Genetics, University of Bonn, School of Medicine & University Hospital Bonn, 53127, Bonn, Germany
| | - Timo Hess
- Institute of Human Genetics, Philipps University of Marburg, 35033, Marburg, Germany
- Institute of Human Genetics, University of Bonn, School of Medicine & University Hospital Bonn, 53127, Bonn, Germany
| | - Thomas Wolf
- Systems Biology and Bioinformatics Unit, Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany
| | - Julia Schröder
- Institute of Human Genetics, University of Bonn, School of Medicine & University Hospital Bonn, 53127, Bonn, Germany
| | - Michael Weber
- Research Group Fungal Septomics, Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany
- Systems Biology and Bioinformatics Unit, Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany
- Institute of Molecular Pathogenesis, Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute, 07743, Jena, Germany
| | - Kerstin Hünniger
- Research Group Fungal Septomics, Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany
- Institute for Hygiene and Microbiology, Julius Maximilians University of Wuerzburg, 97080, Wuerzburg, Germany
| | - Jürgen Löffler
- Department of Internal Medicine II, University Hospital Wuerzburg, Josef-Schneider-Strasse 2 /C11, 97080, Wuerzburg, Germany
| | - Slavena Vylkova
- Research Group Host Fungal Interfaces, Septomics Research Center and Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany
| | - Gianni Panagiotou
- Department of Microbiome Dynamics, Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany
- Faculty of Biological Sciences, Friedrich Schiller University, 07743, Jena, Germany
- Department of Medicine and State Key Laboratory of Pharmaceutical Biotechnology, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China
| | - Johannes Schumacher
- Institute of Human Genetics, Philipps University of Marburg, 35033, Marburg, Germany.
- Institute of Human Genetics, University of Bonn, School of Medicine & University Hospital Bonn, 53127, Bonn, Germany.
| | - Oliver Kurzai
- Research Group Fungal Septomics, Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology-Hans Knoell Institute, 07745, Jena, Germany.
- Institute for Hygiene and Microbiology, Julius Maximilians University of Wuerzburg, 97080, Wuerzburg, Germany.
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5
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Gibbs KD, Wang L, Yang Z, Anderson CE, Bourgeois JS, Cao Y, Gaggioli MR, Biel M, Puertollano R, Chen CC, Ko DC. Human variation impacting MCOLN2 restricts Salmonella Typhi replication by magnesium deprivation. CELL GENOMICS 2023; 3:100290. [PMID: 37228749 PMCID: PMC10203047 DOI: 10.1016/j.xgen.2023.100290] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/02/2022] [Revised: 01/24/2023] [Accepted: 02/27/2023] [Indexed: 05/27/2023]
Abstract
Human genetic diversity can reveal critical factors in host-pathogen interactions. This is especially useful for human-restricted pathogens like Salmonella enterica serovar Typhi (S. Typhi), the cause of typhoid fever. One key defense during bacterial infection is nutritional immunity: host cells attempt to restrict bacterial replication by denying bacteria access to key nutrients or supplying toxic metabolites. Here, a cellular genome-wide association study of intracellular replication by S. Typhi in nearly a thousand cell lines from around the world-and extensive follow-up using intracellular S. Typhi transcriptomics and manipulation of magnesium availability-demonstrates that the divalent cation channel mucolipin-2 (MCOLN2 or TRPML2) restricts S. Typhi intracellular replication through magnesium deprivation. Mg2+ currents, conducted through MCOLN2 and out of endolysosomes, were measured directly using patch-clamping of the endolysosomal membrane. Our results reveal Mg2+ limitation as a key component of nutritional immunity against S. Typhi and as a source of variable host resistance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kyle D. Gibbs
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Liuyang Wang
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Zhuo Yang
- Department of Pharmacy, Center for Drug Research, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, Germany
| | - Caroline E. Anderson
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Jeffrey S. Bourgeois
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Yanlu Cao
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Margaret R. Gaggioli
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Martin Biel
- Department of Pharmacy, Center for Drug Research, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, Germany
| | - Rosa Puertollano
- Cell and Developmental Biology Center, National Heart, Lung, & Blood Institute, NIH, Bethesda, MD 20892, USA
| | - Cheng-Chang Chen
- Department of Clinical Laboratory Sciences and Medical Biotechnology, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei 100, Taiwan
- Department of Laboratory Medicine, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei 100, Taiwan
| | - Dennis C. Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
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6
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Serine/Threonine Phosphatase Calcineurin Orchestrates the Intrinsic Resistance to Micafungin in the Human-Pathogenic Fungus Mucor circinelloides. Antimicrob Agents Chemother 2023; 67:e0068622. [PMID: 36688672 PMCID: PMC9933632 DOI: 10.1128/aac.00686-22] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/24/2023] Open
Abstract
Procedures such as solid-organ transplants and cancer treatments can leave many patients in an immunocompromised state. This leads to their increased susceptibility to opportunistic diseases such as fungal infections. Mucormycosis infections are continually emerging and pose a serious threat to immunocompromised patients. Recently there has been a sharp increase in mucormycosis cases as a secondary infection in patients battling severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infections. Mucorales fungi are notorious for presenting resistance to most antifungal drugs. The absence of effective means to treat these infections results in mortality rates approaching 100% in cases of disseminated infection. One of the most effective antifungal drug classes currently available is the echinocandins. Echinocandins seem to be efficacious in the treatment of many other fungal infections. Unfortunately, susceptibility testing has found that echinocandins have little to no effect on Mucorales fungi. In this study, we found that the model Mucorales Mucor circinelloides genome carries three copies of the genes encoding the echinocandin target protein β-(1,3)-d-glucan synthase (fksA, fksB, and fksC). Interestingly, we found that exposing M. circinelloides to micafungin significantly increased the expression of the fksA and fksB genes, resulting in an increased accumulation of β-(1,3)-d-glucan on the cell walls. However, this overexpression of the fks genes is not directly connected to the intrinsic resistance. Subsequent investigation discovered that the serine/threonine phosphatase calcineurin regulates the expression of fksA and fksB, and the deletion of calcineurin results in a decrease in expression of all three fks genes. Deletion of calcineurin also results in a lower minimum effective concentration (MEC) of micafungin. In addition, we found that duplication of the fks gene is also responsible for the intrinsic resistance, in which lack of either fksA or fksB led a lower MEC of micafungin. Together, these findings demonstrate that calcineurin and fks gene duplication contribute to the intrinsic resistance to micafungin we observe in M. circinelloides.
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7
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Gilliland HN, Olive AJ. GarD-ing the pathogen-containing vacuole from destruction. Cell Host Microbe 2022; 30:1655-1657. [PMID: 36521440 DOI: 10.1016/j.chom.2022.11.007] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/15/2022]
Abstract
The human pathogen Chlamydia trachomatis evades killing by IFNγ-activated mechanisms, yet how this occurs remains unclear. In this issue of Cell Host & Microbe, Walsh et al. identify an IFNγ-dependent antimicrobial mechanism mediated by the host ubiquitin ligase RNF213 that is evaded by the Chlamydia effector GarD.
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Affiliation(s)
- Haleigh N Gilliland
- Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, College of Osteopathic Medicine, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA
| | - Andrew J Olive
- Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, College of Osteopathic Medicine, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA.
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8
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Walsh SC, Reitano JR, Dickinson MS, Kutsch M, Hernandez D, Barnes AB, Schott BH, Wang L, Ko DC, Kim SY, Valdivia RH, Bastidas RJ, Coers J. The bacterial effector GarD shields Chlamydia trachomatis inclusions from RNF213-mediated ubiquitylation and destruction. Cell Host Microbe 2022; 30:1671-1684.e9. [PMID: 36084633 PMCID: PMC9772000 DOI: 10.1016/j.chom.2022.08.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/20/2021] [Revised: 05/13/2022] [Accepted: 08/12/2022] [Indexed: 01/26/2023]
Abstract
Chlamydia trachomatis is the leading cause of sexually transmitted bacterial infections and a major threat to women's reproductive health in particular. This obligate intracellular pathogen resides and replicates within a cellular compartment termed an inclusion, where it is sheltered by unknown mechanisms from gamma-interferon (IFNγ)-induced cell-autonomous host immunity. Through a genetic screen, we uncovered the Chlamydia inclusion membrane protein gamma resistance determinant (GarD) as a bacterial factor protecting inclusions from cell-autonomous immunity. In IFNγ-primed human cells, inclusions formed by garD loss-of-function mutants become decorated with linear ubiquitin and are eliminated. Leveraging cellular genome-wide association data, we identified the ubiquitin E3 ligase RNF213 as a candidate anti-Chlamydia protein. We demonstrate that IFNγ-inducible RNF213 facilitates the ubiquitylation and destruction of GarD-deficient inclusions. Furthermore, we show that GarD operates as a cis-acting stealth factor barring RNF213 from targeting inclusions, thus functionally defining GarD as an RNF213 antagonist essential for chlamydial growth during IFNγ-stimulated immunity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stephen C. Walsh
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Jeffrey R. Reitano
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America.,Department of Immunology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Mary S. Dickinson
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Miriam Kutsch
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Dulcemaria Hernandez
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Alyson B. Barnes
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Benjamin H. Schott
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Liuyang Wang
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Dennis C. Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - So Young Kim
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Raphael H. Valdivia
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Robert J. Bastidas
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America
| | - Jörn Coers
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America.,Department of Immunology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, United States of America.,corresponding author and lead contact:
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9
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Abstract
Since the identification of sickle cell trait as a heritable form of resistance to malaria, candidate gene studies, linkage analysis paired with sequencing, and genome-wide association (GWA) studies have revealed many examples of genetic resistance and susceptibility to infectious diseases. GWA studies enabled the identification of many common variants associated with small shifts in susceptibility to infectious diseases. This is exemplified by multiple loci associated with leprosy, malaria, HIV, tuberculosis, and coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), which illuminate genetic architecture and implicate pathways underlying pathophysiology. Despite these successes, most of the heritability of infectious diseases remains to be explained. As the field advances, current limitations may be overcome by applying methodological innovations such as cellular GWA studies and phenome-wide association (PheWA) studies as well as by improving methodological rigor with more precise case definitions, deeper phenotyping, increased cohort diversity, and functional validation of candidate loci in the laboratory or human challenge studies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kyle D Gibbs
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA;
| | - Benjamin H Schott
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA; .,Duke University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA
| | - Dennis C Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA; .,Duke University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA.,Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, USA
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10
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Schott BH, Wang L, Zhu X, Harding AT, Ko ER, Bourgeois JS, Washington EJ, Burke TW, Anderson J, Bergstrom E, Gardener Z, Paterson S, Brennan RG, Chiu C, McClain MT, Woods CW, Gregory SG, Heaton NS, Ko DC. Single-cell genome-wide association reveals that a nonsynonymous variant in ERAP1 confers increased susceptibility to influenza virus. CELL GENOMICS 2022; 2:100207. [PMID: 36465279 PMCID: PMC9718543 DOI: 10.1016/j.xgen.2022.100207] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/02/2022] [Revised: 07/26/2022] [Accepted: 10/07/2022] [Indexed: 06/17/2023]
Abstract
During pandemics, individuals exhibit differences in risk and clinical outcomes. Here, we developed single-cell high-throughput human in vitro susceptibility testing (scHi-HOST), a method for rapidly identifying genetic variants that confer resistance and susceptibility. We applied this method to influenza A virus (IAV), the cause of four pandemics since the start of the 20th century. scHi-HOST leverages single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) to simultaneously assign genetic identity to cells in mixed infections of cell lines of European, African, and Asian origin, reveal associated genetic variants for viral burden, and identify expression quantitative trait loci. Integration of scHi-HOST with human challenge and experimental validation demonstrated that a missense variant in endoplasmic reticulum aminopeptidase 1 (ERAP1; rs27895) increased IAV burden in cells and human volunteers. rs27895 exhibits population differentiation, likely contributing to greater permissivity of cells from African populations to IAV. scHi-HOST is a broadly applicable method and resource for decoding infectious-disease genetics.
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Affiliation(s)
- Benjamin H Schott
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0048B CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Duke University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- These authors contributed equally
| | - Liuyang Wang
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0048B CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- These authors contributed equally
| | - Xinyu Zhu
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0048B CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Alfred T Harding
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0048B CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Emily R Ko
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Hospital Medicine, Division of General Internal Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke Regional Hospital, Durham, NC 27705, USA
| | - Jeffrey S Bourgeois
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0048B CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Duke University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Erica J Washington
- Department of Biochemistry, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Thomas W Burke
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Jack Anderson
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Emma Bergstrom
- Section of Infectious Diseases and Immunity, Imperial College London, London, W12 0NN, UK
| | - Zoe Gardener
- Section of Infectious Diseases and Immunity, Imperial College London, London, W12 0NN, UK
| | - Suzanna Paterson
- Section of Infectious Diseases and Immunity, Imperial College London, London, W12 0NN, UK
| | - Richard G Brennan
- Department of Biochemistry, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Christopher Chiu
- Section of Infectious Diseases and Immunity, Imperial College London, London, W12 0NN, UK
| | - Micah T McClain
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, NC 27705, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Christopher W Woods
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, NC 27705, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Simon G Gregory
- Duke Molecular Physiology Institute, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Nicholas S Heaton
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0048B CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Dennis C Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0048B CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Duke University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Lead contact
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11
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Han Y, Tan L, Zhou T, Yang L, Carrau L, Lacko LA, Saeed M, Zhu J, Zhao Z, Nilsson-Payant BE, Lira Neto FT, Cahir C, Giani AM, Chai JC, Li Y, Dong X, Moroziewicz D, Paull D, Zhang T, Koo S, Tan C, Danziger R, Ba Q, Feng L, Chen Z, Zhong A, Wise GJ, Xiang JZ, Wang H, Schwartz RE, tenOever BR, Noggle SA, Rice CM, Qi Q, Evans T, Chen S. A human iPSC-array-based GWAS identifies a virus susceptibility locus in the NDUFA4 gene and functional variants. Cell Stem Cell 2022; 29:1475-1490.e6. [PMID: 36206731 PMCID: PMC9550219 DOI: 10.1016/j.stem.2022.09.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/25/2021] [Revised: 06/09/2022] [Accepted: 09/16/2022] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
Population-based studies to identify disease-associated risk alleles typically require samples from a large number of individuals. Here, we report a human-induced pluripotent stem cell (hiPSC)-based screening strategy to link human genetics with viral infectivity. A genome-wide association study (GWAS) identified a cluster of single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in a cis-regulatory region of the NDUFA4 gene, which was associated with susceptibility to Zika virus (ZIKV) infection. Loss of NDUFA4 led to decreased sensitivity to ZIKV, dengue virus, and SARS-CoV-2 infection. Isogenic hiPSC lines carrying non-risk alleles of SNPs or deletion of the cis-regulatory region lower sensitivity to viral infection. Mechanistic studies indicated that loss/reduction of NDUFA4 causes mitochondrial stress, which leads to the leakage of mtDNA and thereby upregulation of type I interferon signaling. This study provides proof-of-principle for the application of iPSC arrays in GWAS and identifies NDUFA4 as a previously unknown susceptibility locus for viral infection.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yuling Han
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Lei Tan
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA; Center for Energy Metabolism and Reproduction, Institute of Biomedicine and Biotechnology, Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen, China
| | - Ting Zhou
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA; Stem Cell Research Facility, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, 1275 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Liuliu Yang
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Lucia Carrau
- Department of Microbiology, New York University, 430 E 29th Street, New York, NY 10016, USA
| | - Lauretta A Lacko
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Mohsan Saeed
- Laboratory of Virology and Infectious Disease, The Rockefeller University, New York, NY 10065, USA; Department of Biochemistry, Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, MA 02118, USA; National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories (NEIDL), Boston University, Boston, MA 02118, USA
| | - Jiajun Zhu
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Zeping Zhao
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | | | | | - Clare Cahir
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA; The Tri-Institutional PhD Program in Chemical Biology, New York, NY, USA
| | - Alice Maria Giani
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Jin Chou Chai
- Department of Epidemiology & Population Health, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, 1300 Morris Park Avenue, Bronx, NY 10461, USA
| | - Yang Li
- Department of Epidemiology & Population Health, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, 1300 Morris Park Avenue, Bronx, NY 10461, USA
| | - Xue Dong
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Dorota Moroziewicz
- The New York Stem Cell Foundation Research Institute, 619 West 54th Street, 3rd Floor, New York, NY 10019, USA
| | - Daniel Paull
- The New York Stem Cell Foundation Research Institute, 619 West 54th Street, 3rd Floor, New York, NY 10019, USA
| | - Tuo Zhang
- Genomic Resource Core Facility, Weill Cornell Medical College, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Soyeon Koo
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA; Weill Cornell Neuroscience PhD Program, New York, NY, USA
| | - Christina Tan
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Ron Danziger
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Qian Ba
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA; School of Public Health, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China
| | - Lingling Feng
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA; Key Laboratory of Pesticide and Chemical Biology (CCNU), Ministry of Education, College of Chemistry, Central China Normal University, Wuhan, Hubei 430079, China
| | - Zhengming Chen
- Department of Population Health Sciences, Weill Cornell Medicine, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Aaron Zhong
- Stem Cell Research Facility, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, 1275 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Gilbert J Wise
- Department of Urology, Weill Cornell Medicine, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Jenny Z Xiang
- Genomic Resource Core Facility, Weill Cornell Medical College, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Hui Wang
- School of Public Health, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China
| | - Robert E Schwartz
- Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Department of Medicine, Weill Cornell Medicine, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA; Department of Physiology, Biophysics, and Systems Biology, Weill Cornell Medicine, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Benjamin R tenOever
- Department of Microbiology, New York University, 430 E 29th Street, New York, NY 10016, USA
| | - Scott A Noggle
- The New York Stem Cell Foundation Research Institute, 619 West 54th Street, 3rd Floor, New York, NY 10019, USA
| | - Charles M Rice
- Laboratory of Virology and Infectious Disease, The Rockefeller University, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Qibin Qi
- Department of Epidemiology & Population Health, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, 1300 Morris Park Avenue, Bronx, NY 10461, USA
| | - Todd Evans
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA
| | - Shuibing Chen
- Department of Surgery, Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065, USA.
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12
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Integration of the Salmonella Typhimurium Methylome and Transcriptome Reveals That DNA Methylation and Transcriptional Regulation Are Largely Decoupled under Virulence-Related Conditions. mBio 2022; 13:e0346421. [PMID: 35658533 PMCID: PMC9239280 DOI: 10.1128/mbio.03464-21] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/02/2022] Open
Abstract
Despite being in a golden age of bacterial epigenomics, little work has systematically examined the plasticity and functional impacts of the bacterial DNA methylome. Here, we leveraged single-molecule, real-time sequencing (SMRT-seq) to examine the m6A DNA methylome of two Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium strains: 14028s and a ΔmetJ mutant with derepressed methionine metabolism, grown in Luria broth or medium that simulates the intracellular environment. We found that the methylome is remarkably static: >95% of adenosine bases retain their methylation status across conditions. Integration of methylation with transcriptomic data revealed limited correlation between changes in methylation and gene expression. Further, examination of the transcriptome in ΔyhdJ bacteria lacking the m6A methylase with the most dynamic methylation pattern in our data set revealed little evidence of YhdJ-mediated gene regulation. Curiously, despite G(m6A)TC motifs being particularly resistant to change across conditions, incorporating dam mutants into our analyses revealed two examples where changes in methylation and transcription may be linked across conditions. This includes the novel finding that the ΔmetJ motility defect may be partially driven by hypermethylation of the chemotaxis gene tsr. Together, these data redefine the S. Typhimurium epigenome as a highly stable system that has rare but important roles in transcriptional regulation. Incorporating these lessons into future studies will be critical as we progress through the epigenomic era.
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13
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Gonçalves SM, Cunha C, Carvalho A. Understanding the genetic basis of immune responses to fungal infection. Expert Rev Anti Infect Ther 2022; 20:987-996. [PMID: 35385368 DOI: 10.1080/14787210.2022.2063839] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/04/2022]
Abstract
INTRODUCTION Fungal infections represent a global public health problem that affect millions of people. Despite remarkable advances achieved over the last decades, available diagnostic and therapeutic tools remain insufficient for the optimal management of these diseases. The clinical course of fungal infection is highly variable, and evidence accumulated from patients with rare mutations and cohort-based studies suggests that the trajectory of disease is largely defined by patient genetics and its impact on immune responses. Therefore, there is an urgent need to elucidate the precise mechanisms by which which genetic variants influence the risk, progression, and outcome of fungal infection. AREAS COVERED In this review, we highlight recent advances in our understanding of the genetic factors that influence antifungal immune responses based on candidate gene studies and genome-wide approaches performed in different experimental and clinical models. EXPERT OPINION Research on genetics of susceptibility to infection is expected to lead to a detailed knowledge framework for the pathogenesis of human fungal infections and unveil novel targets and pathways amenable to clinical intervention.
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Affiliation(s)
- Samuel M Gonçalves
- Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal.,ICVS/3B's - PT Government Associate Laboratory, Braga/Guimarães, Portugal
| | - Cristina Cunha
- Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal.,ICVS/3B's - PT Government Associate Laboratory, Braga/Guimarães, Portugal
| | - Agostinho Carvalho
- Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal.,ICVS/3B's - PT Government Associate Laboratory, Braga/Guimarães, Portugal
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14
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Boahen CK, Temba GS, Kullaya VI, Matzaraki V, Joosten LAB, Kibiki G, Mmbaga BT, van der Ven A, de Mast Q, Netea MG, Kumar V. A functional genomics approach in Tanzanian population identifies distinct genetic regulators of cytokine production compared to European population. Am J Hum Genet 2022; 109:471-485. [PMID: 35167808 DOI: 10.1016/j.ajhg.2022.01.014] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/14/2021] [Accepted: 01/24/2022] [Indexed: 12/23/2022] Open
Abstract
Humans exhibit remarkable interindividual and interpopulation immune response variability upon microbial challenges. Cytokines play a vital role in regulating inflammation and immune responses, but dysregulation of cytokine responses has been implicated in different disease states. Host genetic factors were previously shown to significantly impact cytokine response heterogeneity mainly in European-based studies, but it is unclear whether these findings are transferable to non-European individuals. Here, we aimed to identify genetic variants modulating cytokine responses in healthy adults of East African ancestry from Tanzania. We leveraged both cytokine and genetic data and performed genome-wide cytokine quantitative trait loci (cQTLs) mapping. The results were compared with another cohort of healthy adults of Western European ancestry via direct overlap and functional enrichment analyses. We also performed meta-analyses to identify cQTLs with congruent effect direction in both populations. In the Tanzanians, cQTL mapping identified 80 independent suggestive loci and one genome-wide significant locus (TBC1D22A) at chromosome 22; SNP rs12169244 was associated with IL-1b release after Salmonella enteritidis stimulation. Remarkably, the identified cQTLs varied significantly when compared to the European cohort, and there was a very limited percentage of overlap (1.6% to 1.9%). We further observed ancestry-specific pathways regulating induced cytokine responses, and there was significant enrichment of the interferon pathway specifically in the Tanzanians. Furthermore, contrary to the Europeans, genetic variants in the TLR10-TLR1-TLR6 locus showed no effect on cytokine response. Our data reveal both ancestry-specific effects of genetic variants and pathways on cytokine response heterogeneity, hence arguing for the importance of initiatives to include diverse populations into genomics research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Collins K Boahen
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Institute of Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands
| | - Godfrey S Temba
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; Department of Medical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Kilimanjaro Christian Medical University College, Moshi 251, Tanzania
| | - Vesla I Kullaya
- Department of Medical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Kilimanjaro Christian Medical University College, Moshi 251, Tanzania; Kilimanjaro Clinical Research Institute, Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center, Moshi 251, Tanzania
| | - Vasiliki Matzaraki
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Institute of Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands
| | - Leo A B Joosten
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Institute of Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands
| | - Gibson Kibiki
- Kilimanjaro Clinical Research Institute, Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center, Moshi 251, Tanzania; Department of Paediatrics, Kilimanjaro Christian Medical University College, Moshi 251, Tanzania
| | - Blandina T Mmbaga
- Kilimanjaro Clinical Research Institute, Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center, Moshi 251, Tanzania
| | - Andre van der Ven
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; Department of Medical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Kilimanjaro Christian Medical University College, Moshi 251, Tanzania
| | - Quirijn de Mast
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands
| | - Mihai G Netea
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Institute of Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; Department for Genomics and Immunoregulation, Life and Medical Sciences Institute, University of Bonn, Bonn 53115, Germany
| | - Vinod Kumar
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Institute of Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen 6525, the Netherlands; University of Groningen, University Medical Center Groningen, Department of Genetics, Groningen 9700, the Netherlands; Nitte (Deemed to be University), Nitte University Centre for Science Education and Research, Medical Sciences Complex, Deralakatte, Mangalore 575018, India.
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15
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van Sluijs L, Bosman KJ, Pankok F, Blokhina T, Wilten JIHA, te Molder DM, Riksen JAG, Snoek BL, Pijlman GP, Kammenga JE, Sterken MG. Balancing Selection of the Intracellular Pathogen Response in Natural Caenorhabditis elegans Populations. Front Cell Infect Microbiol 2022; 11:758331. [PMID: 35174100 PMCID: PMC8841876 DOI: 10.3389/fcimb.2021.758331] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/13/2021] [Accepted: 12/21/2021] [Indexed: 12/17/2022] Open
Abstract
Genetic variation in host populations may lead to differential viral susceptibilities. Here, we investigate the role of natural genetic variation in the Intracellular Pathogen Response (IPR), an important antiviral pathway in the model organism Caenorhabditis elegans against Orsay virus (OrV). The IPR involves transcriptional activity of 80 genes including the pals-genes. We examine the genetic variation in the pals-family for traces of selection and explore the molecular and phenotypic effects of having distinct pals-gene alleles. Genetic analysis of 330 global C. elegans strains reveals that genetic diversity within the IPR-related pals-genes can be categorized in a few haplotypes worldwide. Importantly, two key IPR regulators, pals-22 and pals-25, are in a genomic region carrying signatures of balancing selection, suggesting that different evolutionary strategies exist in IPR regulation. We infected eleven C. elegans strains that represent three distinct pals-22 pals-25 haplotypes with Orsay virus to determine their susceptibility. For two of these strains, N2 and CB4856, the transcriptional response to infection was also measured. The results indicate that pals-22 pals-25 haplotype shapes the defense against OrV and host genetic variation can result in constitutive activation of IPR genes. Our work presents evidence for balancing genetic selection of immunity genes in C. elegans and provides a novel perspective on the functional diversity that can develop within a main antiviral response in natural host populations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lisa van Sluijs
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
- Laboratory of Virology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Kobus J. Bosman
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Frederik Pankok
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Tatiana Blokhina
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Jop I. H. A. Wilten
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Dennie M. te Molder
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Joost A. G. Riksen
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Basten L. Snoek
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Gorben P. Pijlman
- Laboratory of Virology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Jan E. Kammenga
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
| | - Mark G. Sterken
- Laboratory of Nematology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
- Laboratory of Virology, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, Netherlands
- *Correspondence: Mark G. Sterken,
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16
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Barnes AB, Keener RM, Schott BH, Wang L, Valdivia RH, Ko DC. Human genetic diversity regulating the TLR10/TLR1/TLR6 locus confers increased cytokines in response to Chlamydia trachomatis. HGG ADVANCES 2022; 3:100071. [PMID: 35047856 PMCID: PMC8756536 DOI: 10.1016/j.xhgg.2021.100071] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/28/2021] [Accepted: 11/15/2021] [Indexed: 12/25/2022] Open
Abstract
Human genetic diversity can have profound effects on health outcomes upon exposure to infectious agents. For infections with Chlamydia trachomatis (C. trachomatis), the wide range of genital and ocular disease manifestations are likely influenced by human genetic differences that regulate interactions between C. trachomatis and host cells. We leveraged this diversity in cellular responses to demonstrate the importance of variation at the Toll-like receptor 1 (TLR1), TLR6, and TLR10 locus to cytokine production in response to C. trachomatis. We determined that a single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) (rs1057807), located in a region that forms a loop with the TLR6 promoter, is associated with increased expression of TLR1, TLR6, and TLR10 and secreted levels of ten C. trachomatis-induced cytokines. Production of these C. trachomatis-induced cytokines is primarily dependent on MyD88 and TLR6 based on experiments using inhibitors, blocking antibodies, RNAi, and protein overexpression. Population genetic analyses further demonstrated that the mean IL-6 response of cells from two European populations were higher than the mean response of cells from three African populations and that this difference was partially attributable to variation in rs1057807 allele frequency. In contrast, a SNP associated with a different pro-inflammatory cytokine (rs2869462 associated with the chemokine CXCL10) exhibited an opposite response, underscoring the complexity of how different genetic variants contribute to an individual's immune response. This multidisciplinary study has identified a long-range chromatin interaction and genetic variation that regulates TLR6 to broaden our understanding of how human genetic variation affects the C. trachomatis-induced immune response.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alyson B. Barnes
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Rachel M. Keener
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Benjamin H. Schott
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Liuyang Wang
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Raphael H. Valdivia
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Dennis C. Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
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17
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Progatzky F, Shapiro M, Chng SH, Garcia-Cassani B, Classon CH, Sevgi S, Laddach A, Bon-Frauches AC, Lasrado R, Rahim M, Amaniti EM, Boeing S, Shah K, Entwistle LJ, Suárez-Bonnet A, Wilson MS, Stockinger B, Pachnis V. Regulation of intestinal immunity and tissue repair by enteric glia. Nature 2021; 599:125-130. [PMID: 34671159 DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-04006-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 73] [Impact Index Per Article: 24.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/21/2020] [Accepted: 09/07/2021] [Indexed: 02/06/2023]
Abstract
Tissue maintenance and repair depend on the integrated activity of multiple cell types1. Whereas the contributions of epithelial2,3, immune4,5 and stromal cells6,7 in intestinal tissue integrity are well understood, the role of intrinsic neuroglia networks remains largely unknown. Here we uncover important roles of enteric glial cells (EGCs) in intestinal homeostasis, immunity and tissue repair. We demonstrate that infection of mice with Heligmosomoides polygyrus leads to enteric gliosis and the upregulation of an interferon gamma (IFNγ) gene signature. IFNγ-dependent gene modules were also induced in EGCs from patients with inflammatory bowel disease8. Single-cell transcriptomics analysis of the tunica muscularis showed that glia-specific abrogation of IFNγ signalling leads to tissue-wide activation of pro-inflammatory transcriptional programs. Furthermore, disruption of the IFNγ-EGC signalling axis enhanced the inflammatory and granulomatous response of the tunica muscularis to helminths. Mechanistically, we show that the upregulation of Cxcl10 is an early immediate response of EGCs to IFNγ signalling and provide evidence that this chemokine and the downstream amplification of IFNγ signalling in the tunica muscularis are required for a measured inflammatory response to helminths and resolution of the granulomatous pathology. Our study demonstrates that IFNγ signalling in enteric glia is central to intestinal homeostasis and reveals critical roles of the IFNγ-EGC-CXCL10 axis in immune response and tissue repair after infectious challenge.
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Affiliation(s)
- Fränze Progatzky
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK.
| | - Michael Shapiro
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK.,AhRimmunity Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Song Hui Chng
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK.,Roche Innovation Center Shanghai, Shanghai, China
| | - Bethania Garcia-Cassani
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Cajsa Helena Classon
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Selin Sevgi
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Anna Laddach
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Ana Carina Bon-Frauches
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK.,Department of Pathology, GROW-School for Oncology and Developmental Biology, Maastricht University Medical Centre, Maastricht, The Netherlands
| | - Reena Lasrado
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Maryam Rahim
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Eleni-Maria Amaniti
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK.,AhRimmunity Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK.,Sainsbury Wellcome Centre, London, UK
| | - Stefan Boeing
- Bioinformatics & Biostatistics STP, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Kathleen Shah
- AhRimmunity Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Lewis J Entwistle
- AhRimmunity Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK.,Adaptive Immunity Research Unit, GSK, Stevenage, UK
| | - Alejandro Suárez-Bonnet
- Department of Pathobiology & Population Sciences, The Royal Veterinary College, Hatfield, UK.,Experimental Histopathology STP, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK
| | - Mark S Wilson
- Immunology Discovery, Genentech Inc, South San Francisco, CA, USA
| | | | - Vassilis Pachnis
- Development and Homeostasis of the Nervous System Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute, London, UK.
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18
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Challenges and Opportunities in Understanding Genetics of Fungal Diseases: Towards a Functional Genomics Approach. Infect Immun 2021; 89:e0000521. [PMID: 34031131 DOI: 10.1128/iai.00005-21] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Infectious diseases are a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, and human pathogens have long been recognized as one of the main sources of evolutionary pressure, resulting in a high variable genetic background in immune-related genes. The study of the genetic contribution to infectious diseases has undergone tremendous advances over the last decades. Here, focusing on genetic predisposition to fungal diseases, we provide an overview of the available approaches for studying human genetic susceptibility to infections, reviewing current methodological and practical limitations. We describe how the classical methods available, such as family-based studies and candidate gene studies, have contributed to the discovery of crucial susceptibility factors for fungal infections. We will also discuss the contribution of novel unbiased approaches to the field, highlighting their success but also their limitations for the fungal immunology field. Finally, we show how a systems genomics approach can overcome those limitations and can lead to efficient prioritization and identification of genes and pathways with a critical role in susceptibility to fungal diseases. This knowledge will help to stratify at-risk patient groups and, subsequently, develop early appropriate prophylactic and treatment strategies.
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19
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ARHGEF26 enhances Salmonella invasion and inflammation in cells and mice. PLoS Pathog 2021; 17:e1009713. [PMID: 34242364 PMCID: PMC8294491 DOI: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1009713] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/18/2020] [Revised: 07/21/2021] [Accepted: 06/14/2021] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
Salmonella hijack host machinery in order to invade cells and establish infection. While considerable work has described the role of host proteins in invasion, much less is known regarding how natural variation in these invasion-associated host proteins affects Salmonella pathogenesis. Here we leveraged a candidate cellular GWAS screen to identify natural genetic variation in the ARHGEF26 (Rho Guanine Nucleotide Exchange Factor 26) gene that renders lymphoblastoid cells susceptible to Salmonella Typhi and Typhimurium invasion. Experimental follow-up redefined ARHGEF26’s role in Salmonella epithelial cell infection. Specifically, we identified complex serovar-by-host interactions whereby ARHGEF26 stimulation of S. Typhi and S. Typhimurium invasion into host cells varied in magnitude and effector-dependence based on host cell type. While ARHGEF26 regulated SopB- and SopE-mediated S. Typhi (but not S. Typhimurium) infection of HeLa cells, the largest effect of ARHGEF26 was observed with S. Typhimurium in polarized MDCK cells through a SopB- and SopE2-independent mechanism. In both cell types, knockdown of the ARHGEF26-associated protein DLG1 resulted in a similar phenotype and serovar specificity. Importantly, we show that ARHGEF26 plays a critical role in S. Typhimurium pathogenesis by contributing to bacterial burden in the enteric fever murine model, as well as inflammation in the colitis infection model. In the enteric fever model, SopB and SopE2 are required for the effects of Arhgef26 deletion on bacterial burden, and the impact of sopB and sopE2 deletion in turn required ARHGEF26. In contrast, SopB and SopE2 were not required for the impacts of Arhgef26 deletion on colitis. A role for ARHGEF26 on inflammation was also seen in cells, as knockdown reduced IL-8 production in HeLa cells. Together, these data reveal pleiotropic roles for ARHGEF26 during infection and highlight that many of the interactions that occur during infection that are thought to be well understood likely have underappreciated complexity. During infection, Salmonella manipulates host cells into engulfing the bacteria and establishing an intracellular niche. While many studies have identified genes involved in different stages of this Salmonella invasion process, few studies have examined how differences between human hosts contribute to infection susceptibility. Here we leveraged a candidate genetic screen to identify natural genetic variation in the human ARHGEF26 gene that correlates with Salmonella invasion. Springboarding from this result, we experimentally tested and redefined ARHGEF26’s role in Salmonella invasion, discovered a new role for ARHGEF26 in regulating inflammation during Salmonella disease, and demonstrated the relevance of these findings in mouse models. Building on how ARHGEF26 functions in other contexts, we implicated two ARHGEF26-interacting host proteins as contributors to Salmonella pathobiology. Collectively, these results identify a potential source of inter-person diversity in susceptibility to Salmonella disease and expand our molecular understanding of Salmonella infection to include a multifaceted role for ARHGEF26. They further identify important future directions in understanding how Salmonella recruit and manipulate ARHGEF26 as well as how ARHGEF26 is able to drive Salmonella-beneficial processes.
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Emam M, Tabatabaei S, Sargolzaei M, Mallard B. Response to Oxidative Burst-Induced Hypoxia Is Associated With Macrophage Inflammatory Profiles as Revealed by Cellular Genome-Wide Association. Front Immunol 2021; 12:688503. [PMID: 34220845 PMCID: PMC8253053 DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2021.688503] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/30/2021] [Accepted: 06/03/2021] [Indexed: 12/27/2022] Open
Abstract
Background In mammalian species, hypoxia is a prominent feature of inflammation. The role of hypoxia in regulating macrophage responses via alteration in metabolic pathways is well established. Recently, oxidative burst-induced hypoxia has been shown in murine macrophages after phagocytosis. Despite the available detailed information on the regulation of macrophage function at transcriptomic and epigenomic levels, the association of genetic polymorphism and macrophage function has been less explored. Previously, we have shown that host genetics controls approximately 80% of the variation in an oxidative burst as measured by nitric oxide (NO-). Further studies revealed two clusters of transcription factors (hypoxia-related and inflammatory-related) are under the genetic control that shapes macrophages’ pro-inflammatory characteristics. Material and Methods In the current study, the association between 43,066 autosomal Single Nucleic Polymorphism (SNPs) and the ability of MDMs in production of NO- in response to E. coli was evaluated in 58 Holstein cows. The positional candidate genes near significant SNPs were selected to perform functional analysis. In addition, the interaction between the positional candidate genes and differentially expressed genes from our previous study was investigated. Results Sixty SNPs on 22 chromosomes of the bovine genome were found to be significantly associated with NO- production of macrophages. The functional genomic analysis showed a significant interaction between positional candidate genes and mitochondria-related differentially expressed genes from the previous study. Further examination showed 7 SNPs located in the vicinity of genes with roles in response to hypoxia, shaping approximately 73% of the observed individual variation in NO- production by MDM. Regarding the normoxic condition of macrophage culture in this study, it was hypothesized that oxidative burst is responsible for causing hypoxia at the cellular level. Conclusion The results suggest that the genetic polymorphism via regulation of response to hypoxia is a candidate step that perhaps shapes macrophage functional characteristics in the pathway of phagocytosis leading to oxidative burst, hypoxia, cellular response to hypoxia and finally the pro-inflammatory responses. Since all cells in one individual carry the same alleles, the effect of genetic predisposition of sensitivity to hypoxia will likely be notable on the clinical outcome to a broad range of host-pathogen interactions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mehdi Emam
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, Canada.,Department of Human Genetics, Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada
| | - Saeid Tabatabaei
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, Canada
| | - Mehdi Sargolzaei
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, Canada.,Select Sires Inc., Plain City, OH, United States
| | - Bonnie Mallard
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, Canada.,Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Biosciences, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, Canada
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21
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Pavlovikj N, Gomes-Neto JC, Deogun JS, Benson AK. ProkEvo: an automated, reproducible, and scalable framework for high-throughput bacterial population genomics analyses. PeerJ 2021; 9:e11376. [PMID: 34055480 PMCID: PMC8142932 DOI: 10.7717/peerj.11376] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/12/2020] [Accepted: 04/08/2021] [Indexed: 12/28/2022] Open
Abstract
Whole Genome Sequence (WGS) data from bacterial species is used for a variety of applications ranging from basic microbiological research, diagnostics, and epidemiological surveillance. The availability of WGS data from hundreds of thousands of individual isolates of individual microbial species poses a tremendous opportunity for discovery and hypothesis-generating research into ecology and evolution of these microorganisms. Flexibility, scalability, and user-friendliness of existing pipelines for population-scale inquiry, however, limit applications of systematic, population-scale approaches. Here, we present ProkEvo, an automated, scalable, reproducible, and open-source framework for bacterial population genomics analyses using WGS data. ProkEvo was specifically developed to achieve the following goals: (1) Automation and scaling of complex combinations of computational analyses for many thousands of bacterial genomes from inputs of raw Illumina paired-end sequence reads; (2) Use of workflow management systems (WMS) such as Pegasus WMS to ensure reproducibility, scalability, modularity, fault-tolerance, and robust file management throughout the process; (3) Use of high-performance and high-throughput computational platforms; (4) Generation of hierarchical-based population structure analysis based on combinations of multi-locus and Bayesian statistical approaches for classification for ecological and epidemiological inquiries; (5) Association of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) genes, putative virulence factors, and plasmids from curated databases with the hierarchically-related genotypic classifications; and (6) Production of pan-genome annotations and data compilation that can be utilized for downstream analysis such as identification of population-specific genomic signatures. The scalability of ProkEvo was measured with two datasets comprising significantly different numbers of input genomes (one with ~2,400 genomes, and the second with ~23,000 genomes). Depending on the dataset and the computational platform used, the running time of ProkEvo varied from ~3-26 days. ProkEvo can be used with virtually any bacterial species, and the Pegasus WMS uniquely facilitates addition or removal of programs from the workflow or modification of options within them. To demonstrate versatility of the ProkEvo platform, we performed a hierarchical-based population structure analyses from available genomes of three distinct pathogenic bacterial species as individual case studies. The specific case studies illustrate how hierarchical analyses of population structures, genotype frequencies, and distribution of specific gene functions can be integrated into an analysis. Collectively, our study shows that ProkEvo presents a practical viable option for scalable, automated analyses of bacterial populations with direct applications for basic microbiology research, clinical microbiological diagnostics, and epidemiological surveillance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Natasha Pavlovikj
- Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America
| | - Joao Carlos Gomes-Neto
- Department of Food Science and Technology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America.,Nebraska Food for Health Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America
| | - Jitender S Deogun
- Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America
| | - Andrew K Benson
- Department of Food Science and Technology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America.,Nebraska Food for Health Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States of America
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22
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Wang L, Balmat TJ, Antonia AL, Constantine FJ, Henao R, Burke TW, Ingham A, McClain MT, Tsalik EL, Ko ER, Ginsburg GS, DeLong MR, Shen X, Woods CW, Hauser ER, Ko DC. An atlas connecting shared genetic architecture of human diseases and molecular phenotypes provides insight into COVID-19 susceptibility. Genome Med 2021; 13:83. [PMID: 34001247 PMCID: PMC8127495 DOI: 10.1186/s13073-021-00904-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 32] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/11/2021] [Accepted: 05/05/2021] [Indexed: 02/08/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND While genome-wide associations studies (GWAS) have successfully elucidated the genetic architecture of complex human traits and diseases, understanding mechanisms that lead from genetic variation to pathophysiology remains an important challenge. Methods are needed to systematically bridge this crucial gap to facilitate experimental testing of hypotheses and translation to clinical utility. RESULTS Here, we leveraged cross-phenotype associations to identify traits with shared genetic architecture, using linkage disequilibrium (LD) information to accurately capture shared SNPs by proxy, and calculate significance of enrichment. This shared genetic architecture was examined across differing biological scales through incorporating data from catalogs of clinical, cellular, and molecular GWAS. We have created an interactive web database (interactive Cross-Phenotype Analysis of GWAS database (iCPAGdb)) to facilitate exploration and allow rapid analysis of user-uploaded GWAS summary statistics. This database revealed well-known relationships among phenotypes, as well as the generation of novel hypotheses to explain the pathophysiology of common diseases. Application of iCPAGdb to a recent GWAS of severe COVID-19 demonstrated unexpected overlap of GWAS signals between COVID-19 and human diseases, including with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis driven by the DPP9 locus. Transcriptomics from peripheral blood of COVID-19 patients demonstrated that DPP9 was induced in SARS-CoV-2 compared to healthy controls or those with bacterial infection. Further investigation of cross-phenotype SNPs associated with both severe COVID-19 and other human traits demonstrated colocalization of the GWAS signal at the ABO locus with plasma protein levels of a reported receptor of SARS-CoV-2, CD209 (DC-SIGN). This finding points to a possible mechanism whereby glycosylation of CD209 by ABO may regulate COVID-19 disease severity. CONCLUSIONS Thus, connecting genetically related traits across phenotypic scales links human diseases to molecular and cellular measurements that can reveal mechanisms and lead to novel biomarkers and therapeutic approaches. The iCPAGdb web portal is accessible at http://cpag.oit.duke.edu and the software code at https://github.com/tbalmat/iCPAGdb .
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Affiliation(s)
- Liuyang Wang
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Thomas J Balmat
- Duke Research Computing, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Alejandro L Antonia
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Florica J Constantine
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Ricardo Henao
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Thomas W Burke
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Andy Ingham
- Duke Research Computing, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Micah T McClain
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
- Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, NC, 27705, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Ephraim L Tsalik
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
- Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, NC, 27705, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Emily R Ko
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
- Department of Hospital Medicine, Duke Regional Hospital, Durham, NC, 27705, USA
| | - Geoffrey S Ginsburg
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Mark R DeLong
- Duke Research Computing, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Xiling Shen
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Woo Center for Big Data and Precision Health, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Christopher W Woods
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
- Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, NC, 27705, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Elizabeth R Hauser
- Duke Molecular Physiology Institute and Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
- Cooperative Studies Program Epidemiology Center-Durham, Durham VA Health Care System, Durham, NC, 27705, USA
| | - Dennis C Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA.
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC, 27710, USA.
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23
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Bourgeois JS, Smith CM, Ko DC. These Are the Genes You're Looking For: Finding Host Resistance Genes. Trends Microbiol 2021; 29:346-362. [PMID: 33004258 PMCID: PMC7969353 DOI: 10.1016/j.tim.2020.09.006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/13/2020] [Revised: 09/05/2020] [Accepted: 09/07/2020] [Indexed: 12/21/2022]
Abstract
Humanity's ongoing struggle with new, re-emerging and endemic infectious diseases serves as a frequent reminder of the need to understand host-pathogen interactions. Recent advances in genomics have dramatically advanced our understanding of how genetics contributes to host resistance or susceptibility to bacterial infection. Here we discuss current trends in defining host-bacterial interactions at the genome-wide level, including screens that harness CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing, natural genetic variation, proteomics, and transcriptomics. We report on the merits, limitations, and findings of these innovative screens and discuss their complementary nature. Finally, we speculate on future innovation as we continue to progress through the postgenomic era and towards deeper mechanistic insight and clinical applications.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jeffrey S Bourgeois
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA; University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA
| | - Clare M Smith
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA; University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA; Duke Human Vaccine Institute, School of Medicine, Duke University Durham, NC, USA
| | - Dennis C Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA; University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA; Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA.
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24
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Abstract
Spurred into action by the COVID-19 pandemic, the global scientific community has, in a short of period of time, made astonishing progress in understanding and combating COVID-19. Given the known human protein machinery for (a) SARS-CoV-2 entry, (b) the host innate immune response, and (c) virus-host interactions (protein-protein and RNA-protein), the potential effects of human genetic variation in this machinery, which may contribute to clinical differences in SARS-CoV-2 pathogenesis and help determine individual risk for COVID-19 infection, are explored. The Genome Aggregation Database (gnomAD) was used to show that several rare germline exome variants of proteins in these pathways occur in the human population, suggesting that carriers of these rare variants (especially for proteins of innate immunity pathways) are at risk for severe symptoms (like the severe symptoms in patients who are known to be rare variant carriers), whereas carriers of other variants could have a protective advantage against infection. The occurrence of genetic variation is thus expected to motivate the experimental probing of natural variants to understand the mechanistic differences in SARS-CoV-2 pathogenesis from one individual to another.
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Affiliation(s)
- Suvobrata Chakravarty
- Chemistry & Biochemistry, South
Dakota State University, Brookings, South Dakota 57007, United
States
- BioSNTR, Brookings, South
Dakota 57007, United States
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25
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Wang L, Balmat TJ, Antonia AL, Constantine FJ, Henao R, Burke TW, Ingham A, McClain MT, Tsalik EL, Ko ER, Ginsburg GS, DeLong MR, Shen X, Woods CW, Hauser ER, Ko DC. An atlas connecting shared genetic architecture of human diseases and molecular phenotypes provides insight into COVID-19 susceptibility. MEDRXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR HEALTH SCIENCES 2020:2020.12.20.20248572. [PMID: 33398303 PMCID: PMC7781346 DOI: 10.1101/2020.12.20.20248572] [Citation(s) in RCA: 18] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/26/2022]
Abstract
While genome-wide associations studies (GWAS) have successfully elucidated the genetic architecture of complex human traits and diseases, understanding mechanisms that lead from genetic variation to pathophysiology remains an important challenge. Methods are needed to systematically bridge this crucial gap to facilitate experimental testing of hypotheses and translation to clinical utility. Here, we leveraged cross-phenotype associations to identify traits with shared genetic architecture, using linkage disequilibrium (LD) information to accurately capture shared SNPs by proxy, and calculate significance of enrichment. This shared genetic architecture was examined across differing biological scales through incorporating data from catalogs of clinical, cellular, and molecular GWAS. We have created an interactive web database (interactive Cross-Phenotype Analysis of GWAS database (iCPAGdb); http://cpag.oit.duke.edu) to facilitate exploration and allow rapid analysis of user-uploaded GWAS summary statistics. This database revealed well-known relationships among phenotypes, as well as the generation of novel hypotheses to explain the pathophysiology of common diseases. Application of iCPAGdb to a recent GWAS of severe COVID-19 demonstrated unexpected overlap of GWAS signals between COVID-19 and human diseases, including with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis driven by the DPP9 locus. Transcriptomics from peripheral blood of COVID-19 patients demonstrated that DPP9 was induced in SARS-CoV-2 compared to healthy controls or those with bacterial infection. Further investigation of cross-phenotype SNPs with severe COVID-19 demonstrated colocalization of the GWAS signal of the ABO locus with plasma protein levels of a reported receptor of SARS-CoV-2, CD209 (DC-SIGN), pointing to a possible mechanism whereby glycosylation of CD209 by ABO may regulate COVID-19 disease severity. Thus, connecting genetically related traits across phenotypic scales links human diseases to molecular and cellular measurements that can reveal mechanisms and lead to novel biomarkers and therapeutic approaches.
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Affiliation(s)
- Liuyang Wang
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | | | - Alejandro L. Antonia
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Florica J. Constantine
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Ricardo Henao
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Thomas W. Burke
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Andy Ingham
- Duke Research Computing, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Micah T. McClain
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, NC 27705, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Ephraim L. Tsalik
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, NC 27705, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Emily R. Ko
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Department of Hospital Medicine, Duke Regional Hospital, Durham, NC, 27705, USA
| | - Geoffrey S. Ginsburg
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Mark R. DeLong
- Duke Research Computing, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Xiling Shen
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Woo Center for Big Data and Precision Health, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Christopher W. Woods
- Center for Applied Genomics and Precision Medicine, Department of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Durham Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Durham, NC 27705, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC 27710, USA
| | - Elizabeth R. Hauser
- Duke Molecular Physiology Institute and Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Duke University Medical Center Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Cooperative Studies Program Epidemiology Center-Durham, Durham VA Health Care System, Durham, NC 27705, USA
| | - Dennis C. Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC 27710, USA
- Lead contact
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26
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Host genetics and infectious disease: new tools, insights and translational opportunities. Nat Rev Genet 2020; 22:137-153. [PMID: 33277640 PMCID: PMC7716795 DOI: 10.1038/s41576-020-00297-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 74] [Impact Index Per Article: 18.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 10/14/2020] [Indexed: 12/22/2022]
Abstract
Understanding how human genetics influence infectious disease susceptibility offers the opportunity for new insights into pathogenesis, potential drug targets, risk stratification, response to therapy and vaccination. As new infectious diseases continue to emerge, together with growing levels of antimicrobial resistance and an increasing awareness of substantial differences between populations in genetic associations, the need for such work is expanding. In this Review, we illustrate how our understanding of the host–pathogen relationship is advancing through holistic approaches, describing current strategies to investigate the role of host genetic variation in established and emerging infections, including COVID-19, the need for wider application to diverse global populations mirroring the burden of disease, the impact of pathogen and vector genetic diversity and a broad array of immune and inflammation phenotypes that can be mapped as traits in health and disease. Insights from study of inborn errors of immunity and multi-omics profiling together with developments in analytical methods are further advancing our knowledge of this important area. Infectious diseases are an ever-present global threat. In this Review, Kwok, Mentzer and Knight discuss our latest understanding of how human genetics influence susceptibility to disease. Furthermore, they discuss emerging progress in the interplay between host and pathogen genetics, molecular responses to infection and vaccination, and opportunities to bring these aspects together for rapid responses to emerging diseases such as COVID-19.
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27
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Schott BH, Antonia AL, Wang L, Pittman KJ, Sixt BS, Barnes AB, Valdivia RH, Ko DC. Modeling of variables in cellular infection reveals CXCL10 levels are regulated by human genetic variation and the Chlamydia-encoded CPAF protease. Sci Rep 2020; 10:18269. [PMID: 33106516 PMCID: PMC7588472 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-75129-y] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/22/2020] [Accepted: 10/12/2020] [Indexed: 01/01/2023] Open
Abstract
Susceptibility to infectious diseases is determined by a complex interaction between host and pathogen. For infections with the obligate intracellular bacterium Chlamydia trachomatis, variation in immune activation and disease presentation are regulated by both host genetic diversity and pathogen immune evasion. Previously, we discovered a single nucleotide polymorphism (rs2869462) associated with absolute abundance of CXCL10, a pro-inflammatory T-cell chemokine. Here, we report that levels of CXCL10 change during C. trachomatis infection of cultured cells in a manner dependent on both host and pathogen. Linear modeling of cellular traits associated with CXCL10 levels identified a strong, negative correlation with bacterial burden, suggesting that C. trachomatis actively suppresses CXCL10. We identified the pathogen-encoded factor responsible for this suppression as the chlamydial protease- or proteasome-like activity factor, CPAF. Further, we applied our modeling approach to other host cytokines in response to C. trachomatis and found evidence that RANTES, another T-cell chemoattractant, is actively suppressed by Chlamydia. However, this observed suppression of RANTES is not mediated by CPAF. Overall, our results demonstrate that CPAF suppresses CXCL10 to evade the host cytokine response and that modeling of cellular infection parameters can reveal previously unrecognized facets of host-pathogen interactions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Benjamin H Schott
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
- Duke University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Alejandro L Antonia
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Liuyang Wang
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Kelly J Pittman
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Barbara S Sixt
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
- Laboratory for Molecular Infection Medicine Sweden (MIMS), Umeå Centre for Microbial Research, Department of Molecular Biology, Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden
| | - Alyson B Barnes
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Raphael H Valdivia
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA
| | - Dennis C Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, 0049 CARL Building Box 3053, 213 Research Drive, Durham, NC, 27710, USA.
- Duke University Program in Genetics and Genomics, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA.
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, 27710, USA.
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28
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Soare AY, Watkins TN, Bruno VM. Understanding Mucormycoses in the Age of "omics". Front Genet 2020; 11:699. [PMID: 32695145 PMCID: PMC7339291 DOI: 10.3389/fgene.2020.00699] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/26/2020] [Accepted: 06/09/2020] [Indexed: 12/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Mucormycoses are deadly invasive infections caused by several fungal species belonging to the subphylum Mucoromycotina, order Mucorales. Hallmarks of disease progression include angioinvasion and tissue necrosis that aid in fungal dissemination through the blood stream, causing deeper infections and resulting in poor penetration of antifungal agents to the site of infection. In the absence of surgical removal of the infected focus, antifungal therapy alone is rarely curative. Even when surgical debridement is combined with high-dose antifungal therapy, the mortality associated with mucormycoses is >50%. The unacceptably high mortality rate, limited options for therapy and the extreme morbidity of highly disfiguring surgical therapy provide a clear mandate to understand the molecular mechanisms that govern pathogenesis with the hopes of developing alternative strategies to treat and prevent mucormycoses. In the absence of robust forward and reverse genetic systems available for this taxonomic group of fungi, unbiased next generation sequence (NGS)-based approaches have provided much needed insights into our understanding of many aspects of Mucormycoses, including genome structure, drug resistance, diagnostic development, and fungus-host interactions. Here, we will discuss the specific contributions that NGS-based approaches have made to the field and discuss open questions that can be addressed using similar approaches.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alexandra Y Soare
- Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- Institute of Genome Sciences, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Tonya N Watkins
- Institute of Genome Sciences, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
| | - Vincent M Bruno
- Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
- Institute of Genome Sciences, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, United States
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Wallace C. Eliciting priors and relaxing the single causal variant assumption in colocalisation analyses. PLoS Genet 2020; 16:e1008720. [PMID: 32310995 PMCID: PMC7192519 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1008720] [Citation(s) in RCA: 140] [Impact Index Per Article: 35.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/19/2019] [Revised: 04/30/2020] [Accepted: 03/17/2020] [Indexed: 01/03/2023] Open
Abstract
Horizontal integration of summary statistics from different GWAS traits can be used to evaluate evidence for their shared genetic causality. One popular method to do this is a Bayesian method, coloc, which is attractive in requiring only GWAS summary statistics and no linkage disequilibrium estimates and is now being used routinely to perform thousands of comparisons between traits. Here we show that while most users do not adjust default software values, misspecification of prior parameters can substantially alter posterior inference. We suggest data driven methods to derive sensible prior values, and demonstrate how sensitivity analysis can be used to assess robustness of posterior inference. The flexibility of coloc comes at the expense of an unrealistic assumption of a single causal variant per trait. This assumption can be relaxed by stepwise conditioning, but this requires external software and an LD matrix aligned to study alleles. We have now implemented conditioning within coloc, and propose a new alternative method, masking, that does not require LD and approximates conditioning when causal variants are independent. Importantly, masking can be used in combination with conditioning where allelically aligned LD estimates are available for only a single trait. We have implemented these developments in a new version of coloc which we hope will enable more informed choice of priors and overcome the restriction of the single causal variant assumptions in coloc analysis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Chris Wallace
- Cambridge Institute for Therapeutic Immunology & Infectious Disease, and MRC Biostatistics Unit, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom
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Vellanki S, Billmyre RB, Lorenzen A, Campbell M, Turner B, Huh EY, Heitman J, Lee SC. A Novel Resistance Pathway for Calcineurin Inhibitors in the Human-Pathogenic Mucorales Mucor circinelloides. mBio 2020; 11:e02949-19. [PMID: 31992620 PMCID: PMC6989107 DOI: 10.1128/mbio.02949-19] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/06/2019] [Accepted: 12/16/2019] [Indexed: 12/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Mucormycosis is an emerging lethal fungal infection in immunocompromised patients. Mucor circinelloides is a causal agent of mucormycosis and serves as a model system to understand genetics in Mucorales. Calcineurin is a conserved virulence factor in many pathogenic fungi, and calcineurin inhibition or deletion of the calcineurin regulatory subunit (CnbR) in Mucor results in a shift from hyphal to yeast growth. We analyzed 36 calcineurin inhibitor-resistant or bypass mutants that exhibited hyphal growth in the presence of calcineurin inhibitors or in the yeast-locked cnbRΔ mutant background without carrying any mutations in known calcineurin components. We found that a majority of the mutants had altered sequence in a gene, named here bycA (bypass of calcineurin). bycA encodes an amino acid permease. We verified that both the bycAΔ single mutant and the bycAΔ cnbRΔ double mutant are resistant to calcineurin inhibitor FK506, thereby demonstrating a novel mechanism of resistance against calcineurin inhibitors. We also found that the level of expression of bycA was significantly higher in the wild-type strain treated with FK506 and in the cnbRΔ mutants but was significantly lower in the wild-type strain without FK506 treatment. These findings suggest that bycA is a negative regulator of hyphal growth and/or a positive regulator of yeast growth in Mucor and that calcineurin suppresses expression of the bycA gene at the mRNA level to promote hyphal growth. BycA is involved in the Mucor hypha-yeast transition as our data demonstrate positive correlations among bycA expression, protein kinase A activity, and Mucor yeast growth. Also, calcineurin, independently of its role in morphogenesis, contributes to virulence traits, including phagosome maturation blockade, host cell damages, and proangiogenic growth factor induction during interactions with hosts.IMPORTANCEMucor is intrinsically resistant to most known antifungals, which makes mucormycosis treatment challenging. Calcineurin is a serine/threonine phosphatase that is widely conserved across eukaryotes. When calcineurin function is inhibited in Mucor, growth shifts to a less virulent yeast growth form, which makes calcineurin an attractive target for development of new antifungal drugs. Previously, we identified two distinct mechanisms through which Mucor can become resistant to calcineurin inhibitors involving Mendelian mutations in the gene for FKBP12, including mechanisms corresponding to calcineurin A or B subunits and epimutations silencing the FKBP12 gene. Here, we identified a third novel mechanism where loss-of-function mutations in the amino acid permease corresponding to the bycA gene contribute to resistance against calcineurin inhibitors. When calcineurin activity is absent, BycA can activate protein kinase A (PKA) to promote yeast growth via a cAMP-independent pathway. Our data also show that calcineurin activity contributes to host-pathogen interactions primarily in the pathogenesis of Mucor.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sandeep Vellanki
- South Texas Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases (STCEID), Department of Biology, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, USA
| | - R Blake Billmyre
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, USA
| | - Alejandra Lorenzen
- South Texas Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases (STCEID), Department of Biology, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, USA
| | - Micaela Campbell
- South Texas Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases (STCEID), Department of Biology, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, USA
| | - Broderick Turner
- South Texas Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases (STCEID), Department of Biology, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, USA
| | - Eun Young Huh
- South Texas Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases (STCEID), Department of Biology, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, USA
| | - Joseph Heitman
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, USA
| | - Soo Chan Lee
- South Texas Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases (STCEID), Department of Biology, The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas, USA
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Transcriptomic Profiles of Monocyte-Derived Macrophages in Response to Escherichia coli is Associated with the Host Genetics. Sci Rep 2020; 10:271. [PMID: 31937813 PMCID: PMC6959288 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-019-57089-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/08/2019] [Accepted: 12/21/2019] [Indexed: 01/05/2023] Open
Abstract
Reactive Nitrogen Species (RNS) are a group of bactericidal molecules produced by macrophages in response to pathogens in a process called oxidative burst. Nitric oxide (NO-) is a member of RNS produced from arginine by inducible Nitric Oxide Synthase (iNOS) enzyme. The activity of iNOS and production of NO- by macrophages following stimulation is one of the indicators of macrophage polarization towards M1/proinflammatory. Production of NO- by bovine monocyte-derived macrophage (MDM) and mouse peritoneal macrophages has been shown to be strongly associated with host genetic with the heritability of 0.776 in bovine MDM and 0.8 in mouse peritoneal macrophages. However, the mechanism of genetic regulation of macrophage response has remained less explored. In the current study, the transcriptome of bovine MDMs was compared between two extreme phenotypes that had been classified as high and low responder based on NO- production. The results showed that 179 and 392 genes were differentially expressed (DE) between high and low responder groups at 3 and 18 hours after exposure to Escherichia coli, respectively. A set of 11 Transcription Factors (TFs) (STAT1, IRF7, SPI1, STAT4, IRF1, HIF1A, FOXO3, REL, NFAT5, HIC1, and IRF4) at 3 hours and a set of 13 TFs (STAT1, IRF1, HIF1A, STAT4, ATF4, TP63, EGR1, CDKN2A, RBL1, E2F1, PRDM1, GATA3, and IRF4) at 18 hours after exposure to E. coli were identified to be differentially regulated between the high and low responder phenotypes. These TFs were found to be divided into two clusters of inflammatory- and hypoxia-related TFs. Functional analysis revealed that some key canonical pathways such as phagocytosis, chemotaxis, antigen presentation, and cell-to-cell signalling are enriched among the over-expressed genes by high responder phenotype. Based on the results of this study, it was inferred that the functional characteristics of bovine MDMs are associated with NO-based classification. Since NO- production is strongly associated with host genetics, this study for the first time shows the distinct proinflammatory profiles of macrophages are controlled by the natural genetic polymorphism in an outbred population. In addition, the results suggest that genetics can be considered as a new dimension in the current model of macrophage polarization which is currently described by the combination of stimulants, only.
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Antonia AL, Gibbs KD, Trahair ED, Pittman KJ, Martin AT, Schott BH, Smith JS, Rajagopal S, Thompson JW, Reinhardt RL, Ko DC. Pathogen Evasion of Chemokine Response Through Suppression of CXCL10. Front Cell Infect Microbiol 2019; 9:280. [PMID: 31440475 PMCID: PMC6693555 DOI: 10.3389/fcimb.2019.00280] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/10/2019] [Accepted: 07/23/2019] [Indexed: 01/10/2023] Open
Abstract
Clearance of intracellular pathogens, such as Leishmania (L.) major, depends on an immune response with well-regulated cytokine signaling. Here we describe a pathogen-mediated mechanism of evading CXCL10, a chemokine with diverse antimicrobial functions, including T cell recruitment. Infection with L. major in a human monocyte cell line induced robust CXCL10 transcription without increasing extracellular CXCL10 protein concentrations. We found that this transcriptionally independent suppression of CXCL10 is mediated by the virulence factor and protease, glycoprotein-63 (gp63). Specifically, GP63 cleaves CXCL10 after amino acid A81 at the base of a C-terminal alpha-helix. Cytokine cleavage by GP63 demonstrated specificity, as GP63 cleaved CXCL10 and its homologs, which all bind the CXCR3 receptor, but not distantly related chemokines, such as CXCL8 and CCL22. Further characterization demonstrated that CXCL10 cleavage activity by GP63 was produced by both extracellular promastigotes and intracellular amastigotes. Crucially, CXCL10 cleavage impaired T cell chemotaxis in vitro, indicating that cleaved CXCL10 cannot signal through CXCR3. Ultimately, we propose CXCL10 suppression is a convergent mechanism of immune evasion, as Salmonella enterica and Chlamydia trachomatis also suppress CXCL10. This commonality suggests that counteracting CXCL10 suppression may provide a generalizable therapeutic strategy against intracellular pathogens. Importance Leishmaniasis, an infectious disease that annually affects over one million people, is caused by intracellular parasites that have evolved to evade the host's attempts to eliminate the parasite. Cutaneous leishmaniasis results in disfiguring skin lesions if the host immune system does not appropriately respond to infection. A family of molecules called chemokines coordinate recruitment of the immune cells required to eliminate infection. Here, we demonstrate a novel mechanism that Leishmania (L.) spp. employ to suppress host chemokines: a Leishmania-encoded protease cleaves chemokines known to recruit T cells that fight off infection. We observe that other common human intracellular pathogens, including Chlamydia trachomatis and Salmonella enterica, reduce levels of the same chemokines, suggesting a strong selective pressure to avoid this component of the immune response. Our study provides new insights into how intracellular pathogens interact with the host immune response to enhance pathogen survival.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alejandro L. Antonia
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Kyle D. Gibbs
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Esme D. Trahair
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Kelly J. Pittman
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Amelia T. Martin
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Benjamin H. Schott
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Jeffrey S. Smith
- Department of Biochemistry, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Sudarshan Rajagopal
- Department of Biochemistry, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
- Division of Cardiology, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - J. Will Thompson
- Proteomics and Metabolomics Shared Resource, Center for Genomics and Computational Biology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
| | - Richard Lee Reinhardt
- Department of Biomedical Research, National Jewish Health, Denver, CO, United States
- Department of Immunology and Microbiology, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Aurora, CO, United States
| | - Dennis C. Ko
- Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
- Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States
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Emam M, Tabatabaei S, Sargolzaei M, Sharif S, Schenkel F, Mallard B. The effect of host genetics on in vitro performance of bovine monocyte-derived macrophages. J Dairy Sci 2019; 102:9107-9116. [PMID: 31400895 DOI: 10.3168/jds.2018-15960] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/07/2018] [Accepted: 05/17/2019] [Indexed: 12/11/2022]
Abstract
The dynamic interaction between the host and pathogens, along with environmental factors, influences the regulation of mammalian immune responses. Therefore, comprehensive in vivo immune-phenotyping during an active response to a pathogen can be complex and prone to confounding effects. Evaluating critical fundamental aspects of the immune system at a cellular level is an alternative approach to reduce this complexity. Therefore, the objective of the current study was to examine an in vitro model for functional phenotyping of bovine monocyte-derived macrophages (MDM), cells which play a crucial role at all phases of inflammation, as well influence downstream immune responses. As indicators of MDM function, phagocytosis and nitric oxide (NO-) production were tested in MDM of 16 cows in response to 2 common bacterial pathogens of dairy cows, Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus. Notable functional variations were observed among the individuals (coefficient of variation: 33% for phagocytosis and 70% in the production of NO-). The rank correlation analysis revealed a significant, positive, and strong correlation (rho = 0.92) between NO- production in response to E. coli and S. aureus, and a positive but moderate correlation (rho = 0.58) between phagocytosis of E. coli and S. aureus. To gain further insight into this trait, another 58 cows were evaluated solely for NO- response against E. coli. The pedigree of the tested animals was added to the statistical model and the heritability was estimated to be 0.776. Overall, the finding of this study showed a strong effect of host genetics on the in vitro activities of MDM and the possibility of ranking Holstein cows based on the in vitro functional variation of MDM.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mehdi Emam
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 2W1, Canada; Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Bioscience, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 2W1, Canada.
| | - Saeid Tabatabaei
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 2W1, Canada
| | - Mehdi Sargolzaei
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 2W1, Canada; Select Sires Inc., Plain City, OH 43064
| | - Shayan Sharif
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 2W1, Canada
| | - Flavio Schenkel
- Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Bioscience, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 2W1, Canada
| | - Bonnie Mallard
- Department of Pathobiology, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 2W1, Canada; Center for Genetic Improvement of Livestock, Department of Animal Bioscience, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, N1G 2W1, Canada
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Balla KM, Lažetić V, Troemel ER. Natural variation in the roles of C. elegans autophagy components during microsporidia infection. PLoS One 2019; 14:e0216011. [PMID: 31013330 PMCID: PMC6478341 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0216011] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/05/2019] [Accepted: 04/11/2019] [Indexed: 12/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Natural genetic variation can determine the outcome of an infection, and often reflects the co-evolutionary battle between hosts and pathogens. We previously found that a natural variant of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans from Hawaii (HW) has increased resistance against natural microsporidian pathogens in the Nematocida genus, when compared to the standard laboratory strain of N2. In particular, HW animals can clear infection, while N2 animals cannot. In addition, HW animals have lower levels of initial colonization of Nematocida inside intestinal cells, compared to N2. Here we investigate how this natural variation in resistance relates to autophagy. We found that there is much better targeting of autophagy-related machinery to parasites under conditions where they are cleared. In particular, ubiquitin targeting to Nematocida cells correlates very well with their subsequent clearance in terms of timing, host strain and age, as well as species of Nematocida. Furthermore, clearance correlates with targeting of the LGG-2/LC3 autophagy protein to parasite cells, with HW animals having much more efficient targeting of LGG-2 to parasite cells than N2 animals. Surprisingly, however, we found that LGG-2 is not required to clear infection. Instead, we found that LGG-2/LC3 regulates Nematocida colonization inside intestinal cells. Interestingly, LGG-2/LC3 regulates intracellular colonization only in the HW strain, and not in N2. Altogether these results demonstrate that there is natural genetic variation in an LGG-2-dependent process that regulates microsporidia colonization inside intestinal cells, although not microsporidia clearance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Keir M. Balla
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California, United States of America
| | - Vladimir Lažetić
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California, United States of America
| | - Emily R. Troemel
- Division of Biological Sciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California, United States of America
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Candida albicans Morphology-Dependent Host FGF-2 Response as a Potential Therapeutic Target. J Fungi (Basel) 2019; 5:jof5010022. [PMID: 30841504 PMCID: PMC6462958 DOI: 10.3390/jof5010022] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/10/2019] [Revised: 02/20/2019] [Accepted: 03/01/2019] [Indexed: 12/20/2022] Open
Abstract
Angiogenesis mediated by proteins such as Fibroblast Growth Factor-2 (FGF-2) is a vital component of normal physiological processes and has also been implicated in contributing to the disease state associated with various microbial infections. Previous studies by our group and others have shown that Candida albicans, a common agent of candidiasis, induces FGF-2 secretion in vitro and angiogenesis in brains and kidneys during systemic infections. However, the underlying mechanism(s) via which the fungus increases FGF-2 production and the role(s) that FGF-2/angiogenesis plays in C. albicans disease remain unknown. Here we show, for the first time, that C. albicans hyphae (and not yeast cells) increase the FGF-2 response in human endothelial cells. Moreover, Candidalysin, a toxin secreted exclusively by C. albicans in the hyphal state, is required to induce this response. Our in vivo studies show that in the systemic C. albicans infection model, mice treated with FGF-2 exhibit significantly higher mortality rates when compared to untreated mice not given the angiogenic growth factor. Even treatment with fluconazole could not fully rescue infected animals that were administered FGF-2. Our data suggest that the increase of FGF-2 production/angiogenesis induced by Candidalysin contributes to the pathogenicity of C. albicans.
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Human Immunology through the Lens of Evolutionary Genetics. Cell 2019; 177:184-199. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2019.02.033] [Citation(s) in RCA: 76] [Impact Index Per Article: 15.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/29/2019] [Revised: 02/19/2019] [Accepted: 02/20/2019] [Indexed: 01/04/2023]
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