1. Contribution of Staphylococcal Enterotoxin B to Staphylococcus aureus Systemic Infection.
- Author
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Bae, Justin S, Da, Fei, Liu, Ryan, He, Lei, Lv, Huiying, Fisher, Emilie L, Rajagopalan, Govindarajan, Li, Min, Cheung, Gordon Y C, and Otto, Michael
- Subjects
STAPHYLOCOCCUS aureus infections ,ENTEROTOXINS ,CYTOKINE release syndrome ,LABORATORY mice ,STAPHYLOCOCCUS aureus ,RESEARCH ,ANIMAL experimentation ,RESEARCH methodology ,METHICILLIN-resistant staphylococcus aureus ,MEDICAL cooperation ,EVALUATION research ,STAPHYLOCOCCAL diseases ,COMPARATIVE studies ,MICROBIAL virulence ,TOXINS ,MICE - Abstract
Staphylococcal enterotoxin B (SEB), which is produced by the major human pathogen, Staphylococcus aureus, represents a powerful superantigenic toxin and is considered a bioweapon. However, the contribution of SEB to S. aureus pathogenesis has never been directly demonstrated with genetically defined mutants in clinically relevant strains. Many isolates of the predominant Asian community-associated methicillin-resistant S. aureus lineage sequence type (ST) 59 harbor seb, implying a significant role of SEB in the observed hypervirulence of this lineage. We created an isogenic seb mutant in a representative ST59 isolate and assessed its virulence potential in mouse infection models. We detected a significant contribution of seb to systemic ST59 infection that was associated with a cytokine storm. Our results directly demonstrate that seb contributes to S. aureus pathogenesis, suggesting the value of including SEB as a target in multipronged antistaphylococcal drug development strategies. Furthermore, they indicate that seb contributes to fatal exacerbation of community-associated methicillin-resistant S. aureus infection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2021
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