Antigen variability in Anaplasma phagocytophilum during chronic infection of a reservoir host.
Antigen variability in Anaplasma phagocytophilum during chronic infection of a reservoir host.
复制标题
储存宿主慢性感染过程中嗜吞噬细胞无形体的抗原变异。
DOI:
10.1099/mic.0.059808-0
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发表时间:
2012
期刊:
影响因子:
--
通讯作者:
Foley,Janet
中科院分区:
文献类型:
--
作者:
Rejmanek,Daniel;Foley,Patrick;Barbet,Anthony;Foley,Janet
Anaplasma phagocytophilumis an obligately intracellular, tick-transmitted, bacterial pathogen of humans and other animals. In order to evade host immunity during the course of infection,A. phagocytophilumutilizes gene conversion to shuffle approximately 100 functional pseudogenes into a single expression cassette of themsp2(p44)gene, which encodes the major surface antigen, major surface protein 2 (Msp2). The role and extent ofmsp2(p44)recombination in a reservoir host forA. phagocytophilumhave not been evaluated. In the current study, we explored patterns of recombination and expression site variability of themsp2(p44)gene in three chronically infected woodrats, a reservoir for the disease in the Western USA. All three woodrats developed persistent infection of at least 6 months duration; two of them maintained active infection for at least 8 months. In total, we detected the emergence of 60 uniquemsp2(p44)expression site variants with no common temporal patterns of expression site recombination among the threeA. phagocytophilumpopulations. Both the strength of infection (i.e. pathogen load) and the genetic diversity of pseudogenes detected at themsp2(p44)expression site fluctuated periodically during the course of infection. An analysis of the genomic pseudogene exhaustion rate showed that the repertoire of pseudogenes available to theA. phagocytophilumpopulation could in theory become depleted within a year. However, the apparent emergence of variant pseudogenes suggests that the pathogen could potentially evade host immunity indefinitely. Our findings suggest a tightly co-evolved relationship betweenA. phagocytophilumand woodrats in which the pathogen perpetually evades host immunity yet causes no detectable disease.