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Chaves-Olarte E, Meza-Torres J, Herrera-Rodríguez F, Lizano-González E, Suárez-Esquivel M, Baker KS, Rivas-Solano O, Ruiz-Villalobos N, Villalta-Romero F, Cheng HP, Walker GC, Cloeckaert A, Thomson NR, Frisan T, Moreno E, Guzmán-Verri C. A sensor histidine kinase from a plant-endosymbiont bacterium restores the virulence of a mammalian intracellular pathogen. Microb Pathog 2023; 185:106442. [PMID: 37944675 PMCID: PMC10740080 DOI: 10.1016/j.micpath.2023.106442] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/08/2023] [Revised: 07/22/2023] [Accepted: 11/03/2023] [Indexed: 11/12/2023]
Abstract
Alphaproteobacteria include organisms living in close association with plants or animals. This interaction relies partly on orthologous two-component regulatory systems (TCS), with sensor and regulator proteins modulating the expression of conserved genes related to symbiosis/virulence. We assessed the ability of the exoS+Sm gene, encoding a sensor protein from the plant endosymbiont Sinorhizobium meliloti to substitute its orthologous bvrS in the related animal/human pathogen Brucella abortus. ExoS phosphorylated the B. abortus regulator BvrR in vitro and in cultured bacteria, showing conserved biological function. Production of ExoS in a B. abortus bvrS mutant reestablished replication in host cells and the capacity to infect mice. Bacterial outer membrane properties, the production of the type IV secretion system VirB, and its transcriptional regulators VjbR and BvrR were restored as compared to parental B. abortus. These results indicate that conserved traits of orthologous TCS from bacteria living in and sensing different environments are sufficient to achieve phenotypic plasticity and support bacterial survival. The knowledge of bacterial genetic networks regulating host interactions allows for an understanding of the subtle differences between symbiosis and parasitism. Rewiring these networks could provide new alternatives to control and prevent bacterial infection.
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Affiliation(s)
- Esteban Chaves-Olarte
- Centro de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica; Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional, Heredia, Costa Rica
| | - Jazmín Meza-Torres
- Centro de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | - Fabiola Herrera-Rodríguez
- Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional, Heredia, Costa Rica
| | - Esteban Lizano-González
- Centro de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica; Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional, Heredia, Costa Rica
| | - Marcela Suárez-Esquivel
- Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional, Heredia, Costa Rica
| | - Kate S Baker
- Parasites and Microbes from Pathogen Genomics, Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Wellcome Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridgeshire, UK
| | - Olga Rivas-Solano
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago, Costa Rica
| | - Nazareth Ruiz-Villalobos
- Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional, Heredia, Costa Rica
| | - Fabián Villalta-Romero
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago, Costa Rica
| | - Hai-Ping Cheng
- Biological Sciences Department, Lehman College, The City University of New York, New York, USA
| | - Graham C Walker
- Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | | | - Nicholas R Thomson
- Parasites and Microbes from Pathogen Genomics, Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Wellcome Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridgeshire, UK
| | - Teresa Frisan
- Department of Cell and Molecular Biology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Edgardo Moreno
- Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional, Heredia, Costa Rica
| | - Caterina Guzmán-Verri
- Centro de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica; Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional, Heredia, Costa Rica.
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Castillo-Zeledón A, Rivas-Solano O, Villalta-Romero F, Gómez-Espinoza O, Moreno E, Chaves-Olarte E, Guzmán-Verri C. The Brucella abortus two-component system response regulator BvrR binds to three DNA regulatory boxes in the upstream region of omp25. Front Microbiol 2023; 14:1241143. [PMID: 37779712 PMCID: PMC10538546 DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1241143] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/16/2023] [Accepted: 08/15/2023] [Indexed: 10/03/2023] Open
Abstract
Brucella abortus is a facultative extracellular-intracellular bacterial zoonotic pathogen worldwide. It is also a major cause of abortion in bovines, generating economic losses. The two-component regulatory system BvrR/BvrS modulates the expression of genes required to transition from extracellular to intracellular lifestyles. However, few regulatory regions of BvrR direct target genes have been studied. In this study, we characterized the regulatory region of omp25, a gene encoding an outer membrane protein that is positively regulated by TCS BvrR/BvrS. By omp25-lacZ reporter fusions and β-galactosidase activity assays, we found that the region between-262 and + 127 is necessary for transcriptional activity, particularly a 111-bp long fragment located from-262 to -152. In addition, we demonstrated the binding of P-BvrR to three sites within the -140 to +1 region. Two of these sites were delimited between -18 to +1 and - 99 to -76 by DNase I footprinting and called DNA regulatory boxes 1 and 2, respectively. The third binding site (box 3) was delimited from -140 to -122 by combining EMSA and fluorescence anisotropy results. A molecular docking analysis with HDOCK predicted BvrR-DNA interactions between 11, 13, and 12 amino acid residue-nucleotide pairs in boxes 1, 2, and 3, respectively. A manual sequence alignment of the three regulatory boxes revealed the presence of inverted and non-inverted repeats of five to eight nucleotides, partially matching DNA binding motifs previously described for BvrR. We propose that P-BvrR binds directly to up to three regulatory boxes and probably interacts with other transcription factors to regulate omp25 expression. This gene regulation model could apply to other BvrR target genes and to orthologs of the TCS BvrR/BvrS and Omp25 in phylogenetically closed Rhizobiales.
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Affiliation(s)
- Amanda Castillo-Zeledón
- Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional de Costa Rica, Heredia, Costa Rica
| | - Olga Rivas-Solano
- Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional de Costa Rica, Heredia, Costa Rica
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Campus Tecnológico Central Cartago, Cartago, Costa Rica
| | - Fabián Villalta-Romero
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Campus Tecnológico Central Cartago, Cartago, Costa Rica
| | - Olman Gómez-Espinoza
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Campus Tecnológico Central Cartago, Cartago, Costa Rica
| | - Edgardo Moreno
- Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional de Costa Rica, Heredia, Costa Rica
| | - Esteban Chaves-Olarte
- Centro de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | - Caterina Guzmán-Verri
- Programa de Investigación en Enfermedades Tropicales, Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria, Universidad Nacional de Costa Rica, Heredia, Costa Rica
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Salas-Arias K, Irías-Mata A, Sánchez-Kopper A, Hernández-Moncada R, Salas-Morgan B, Villalta-Romero F, Calvo-Castro LA. Strawberry Fragaria x ananassa cv. Festival: A Polyphenol-Based Phytochemical Characterization in Fruit and Leaf Extracts. Molecules 2023; 28:molecules28041865. [PMID: 36838852 PMCID: PMC9966301 DOI: 10.3390/molecules28041865] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/24/2023] [Revised: 02/03/2023] [Accepted: 02/10/2023] [Indexed: 02/18/2023] Open
Abstract
Berry fruits are an important dietary source of health-promoting antioxidant polyphenols. Interestingly, berry leaves of diverse species, including strawberries, have shown higher bioactive phytochemical content in the leaves than in the fruit. Moreover, the vegetative part of the plants is usually discarded, representing a presumably large source of underutilized bioactive biomass. In this investigation, the polyphenol profiles of tropical highland strawberry (Fragaria x ananassa cv. Festival) leaves and fruits were compared by high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with a diode array detector (UHPLC-DAD) and mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS). The total polyphenol strawberry leaf extracts exhibited a 122-fold-higher total polyphenol content and 13-fold higher antioxidant activity (ORAC) than strawberry fruits, and they showed evidence of possible photoprotective effects against UV damage in human melanoma cells (SK-MEL-28) and in murine embryo fibroblasts (NIH/3T3), together with promising anti-proliferative activities against the same melanoma cells. Seven polyphenols were confirmed by HPLC-DAD in the leaf extracts, with differences depending on fraction solubility. Moreover, three substituted quercetin derivatives, three substituted kaempferol derivatives, two anthocyanins, and catechin were confirmed in the soluble fraction by HPLC-MS. Given their higher total polyphenol content and bioactive activities, underutilized strawberry Festival leaves are a potential source of apparently abundant biomass with prospective bioactive applications.
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Affiliation(s)
- Karla Salas-Arias
- Doctorado en Ciencias Naturales Para el Desarrollo (DOCINADE), Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Universidad Nacional, Universidad Estatal a Distancia, Cartago P.O. Box 159-7050, Costa Rica
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago P.O. Box 159-7050, Costa Rica
| | - Andrea Irías-Mata
- Centro de Investigación en Granos y Semillas, Escuela de Agronomía, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José P.O. Box 2060, Costa Rica
| | - Andrés Sánchez-Kopper
- Centro de Investigación y de Servicios Químicos y Microbiológicos, Escuela de Química, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago P.O. Box 159-7050, Costa Rica
| | - Ricardo Hernández-Moncada
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago P.O. Box 159-7050, Costa Rica
| | - Bridget Salas-Morgan
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago P.O. Box 159-7050, Costa Rica
| | - Fabián Villalta-Romero
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago P.O. Box 159-7050, Costa Rica
- Correspondence: ; Tel.: +506-2550-9411
| | - Laura A. Calvo-Castro
- Centro de Investigación en Biotecnología, Escuela de Biología, Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago P.O. Box 159-7050, Costa Rica
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Villalta-Romero F, Gortat A, Herrera AE, Arguedas R, Quesada J, de Melo RL, Calvete JJ, Montero M, Murillo R, Rucavado A, Gutiérrez JM, Pérez-Payá E. Identification of new snake venom metalloproteinase inhibitors using compound screening and rational Peptide design. ACS Med Chem Lett 2012; 3:540-3. [PMID: 24900507 DOI: 10.1021/ml300068r] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/23/2012] [Accepted: 06/14/2012] [Indexed: 11/29/2022] Open
Abstract
The majority of snakebite envenomations in Central America are caused by the viperid species Bothrops asper, whose venom contains a high proportion of zinc-dependent metalloproteinases that play a relevant role in the pathogenesis of hemorrhage characteristic of these envenomations. Broad metalloproteinase inhibitors, such as the peptidomimetic hydroxamate Batimastat, have been shown to inhibit snake venom metalloproteinases (SVMP). However, the difficulty in having open public access to Batimastat and similar molecules highlights the need to design new inhibitors of SVMPs that could be applied in the treatment of snakebite envenomations. We have chosen the SVMP BaP1 as a model to search for new inhibitors using different strategies, that is, screening of the Prestwick Chemical Library and rational peptide design. Results from these approaches provide clues on the structural requirements for efficient BaP1 inhibition and pave the way for the design of new inhibitors of SVMP.
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Affiliation(s)
- Fabián Villalta-Romero
- Escuela de Química, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
- Instituto Clodomiro Picado,
Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | - Anna Gortat
- Centro de Investigación Príncipe Felipe, E-46012 Valencia, Spain
| | | | - Rebeca Arguedas
- Escuela de Química, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | - Javier Quesada
- Escuela de Química, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | | | | | - Mavis Montero
- Escuela de Química, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | - Renato Murillo
- Escuela de Química, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | - Alexandra Rucavado
- Instituto Clodomiro Picado,
Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | - José María Gutiérrez
- Instituto Clodomiro Picado,
Facultad de Microbiología, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica
| | - Enrique Pérez-Payá
- Centro de Investigación Príncipe Felipe, E-46012 Valencia, Spain
- Instituto de Biomedicina, IBV-CSIC, E-46010 Valencia, Spain
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