Capsule deletion via a λ-Red knockout system perturbs biofilm formation and fimbriae expression in Klebsiella pneumoniae MGH 78578

BMC Research Notes

Pep Charusanti²  Bernhard O Palsson²  Shih-Feng Tsai¹  Hwan-You Chang³  Irene Lam²  Tzu-Wen Huang² 

[1] Institute of Molecular and Genomic Medicine, National Health Research Institutes, 350 Zhunan, Taiwan;Department of Bioengineering, University of California, San Diego La Jolla, CA, 92093-0412 USA;Institute of Molecular Medicine, National Tsing Hua University, 30013 Hsinchu, Taiwan

关键词: Infectious disease;    Transmission electron microscopy;    Gene knockouts;    Expression profiling;    Fimbriae;    Biofilm;    Capsule;    Klebsiella pneumoniae;   

Others  :  1134943
DOI  :  10.1186/1756-0500-7-13

 received in 2013-08-01, accepted in 2013-12-31,  发布年份 2014

【 摘 要 】

Background

Klebsiella pneumoniae is a leading cause of hospital-acquired urinary tract infections and pneumonia worldwide, and is responsible for many cases of pyogenic liver abscess among diabetic patients in Asia. A defining characteristic of this pathogen is the presence of a thick, exterior capsule that has been reported to play a role in biofilm formation and to protect the organism from threats such antibiotics and host immune challenge.

Findings

We constructed two knockout mutants of K. pneumoniae to investigate how perturbations to capsule biosynthesis alter the cellular phenotype. In the first mutant, we deleted the entire gene cluster responsible for biosynthesis of the extracellular polysaccharide capsule. In the second mutant, we deleted the capsule export subsystem within this cluster. We find that both knockout mutants have lower amounts of capsule but produce greater amounts of biofilm. Moreover, one of the two mutants abolishes fimbriae expression as well.

Conclusions

These results are expected to provide insight into the interaction between capsule biosynthesis, biofilm formation, and fimbriae expression in this organism.

【 授权许可】

   
2014 Huang et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

【 图 表 】

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