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Resistance to Lyme disease in decorin-deficient mice

Authors :
Marc C. Dolan
Barbara J. B. Johnson
Betty P. Guo
Renato V. Iozzo
Eric L. Brown
A.M. Smith
Janis J. Weis
R. Mark Wooten
Magnus Höök
Source :
Journal of Clinical Investigation. 107:845-852
Publication Year :
2001
Publisher :
American Society for Clinical Investigation, 2001.

Abstract

Microbial adhesion to the host tissue represents an early, critical step in the pathogenesis of most infectious diseases. BORRELIA: burgdorferi, the causative agent of Lyme disease (LD), expresses two surface-exposed decorin-binding adhesins, DbpA and DbpB. A decorin-deficient (Dcn(-/-)) mouse was recently developed and found to have a relatively mild phenotype. We have now examined the process of experimental LD in Dcn(-/-) mice using both needle inoculation and tick transmission of spirochetes. When exposed to low doses of the infective agent, Dcn(-/-) mice had fewer Borrelia-positive cultures from most tissues analyzed than did Dcn(+/+) or Dcn(+/-) mice. When the infection dose was increased, similar differences were not observed in most tissues but were seen in bacterial colonization of joints and the extent of Borreila-induced arthritis. Quantitative PCR demonstrated that joints harvested from Dcn(-/-) mice had diminished Borrelia numbers compared with issues harvested from Dcn(+/+) controls. Histological examination also revealed a low incidence and severity of arthritis in Dcn(-/-) mice. Conversely, no differences in the numbers of Borreila-positive skin cultures were observed among the different genotypes regardless of the infection dose. These differences, which were observed regardless of genetic background of the mice (BALB/c or C3H/HeN) or method of infection, demonstrate the importance of decorin in the pathogenesis of LD.

Details

ISSN :
00219738
Volume :
107
Database :
OpenAIRE
Journal :
Journal of Clinical Investigation
Accession number :
edsair.doi.dedup.....ece8e0f7366bfdd6e0df6a91e48f2954
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1172/jci11692