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CUTTING EDGE |

*
Center for Immunology and Department of Pathology, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63110; and
Unite des Interactions Bacteries Cellules, Institut Pasteur, Paris, France
| Abstract |
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| Introduction |
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In the experiments described here, we demonstrate that an Ab to listeriolysin O (LLO)3 provides resistance to Listeria infection. LLO, the Ag recognized by the A4-8 mAb, is a 58-kDa secreted protein of Listeria monocytogenes and an important virulence factor (reviewed in Ref. 7). LLO is a member of the family of thiol-activated pore-forming toxins secreted by numerous Gram-positive bacterial species (8). LLO mediates escape of Listeria from the phagosome of an infected cell, allowing the organism to access the cytosol, where it replicates rapidly and avoids the host cells microbicidal actions (9, 10). LLO has also been shown to have numerous exotoxic actions when applied to cells in vitro, although the significance of these cellular responses during in vivo pathogenesis has not been established (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18).
| Materials and Methods |
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CB.17 and CB.17-SCID mice were maintained and bred under SPF conditions in the Washington University mouse facility. For infection with Listeria, mice of either sex were used, between 8 and 16 wk of age.
Bacteria
All experiments utilized L. monocytogenes strain EGD.
The LD50 of this strain in CB.17 or CB.17-SCID
mice is
1 x 103 organisms. Bacteria was
stored as frozen glycerol stocks and thawed once before dilution into
pyrogen-free saline for injection into mice.
mAbs and in vivo use
mAbs utilized in this study were the A4-8 mAb (murine
anti-LLO, IgG1) and the irrelevant control GIR.208 mAb (murine
anti-human IFN-
receptor, IgG1, a gift of Dr. Robert Schreiber,
Washington University, St. Louis, MO). A4-8 was generated by the
immunization of mice with purified LLO plus Freunds adjuvant
(19). This mAb was chosen because it had been shown to
bind LLO in solution and block both membrane binding by the toxin and
subsequent lysis of RBC in vitro. mAbs were purified from ascites using
standard methods on protein A-Sepharose (Sigma, St. Louis, MO) and were
shown to contain less than 10 endotoxin units per milligram protein by
the QCL-1000 endotoxin quantitation kit (BioWhittaker, Walkersville,
MD). Ab concentration was determined by the measurement of absorbance
at OD 280 (1%:13.5). In most experiments, mice were injected with 1 mg
mAb per mouse i.p., 1 day before i.p. infection with
Listeria. Following infection, mice were followed for
survival for 14 days or sacrificed at various time points postinfection
to determine organ Listeria burden. This was done by aseptic
removal of the spleen and/or liver, followed by the homogenization of
each organ in PBS plus 0.05% TX-100. Serial dilutions of homogenate
were plated on brain heart infusion agar, and bacterial CFU were
assessed after overnight growth at 37°C.
Assessment of Ab responses to Listeria infection
CB.17 mice were infected three times (intervals of 2 to 4 wk before reinfection) with Listeria, at doses of 5 x 102, 1 x 103, and 1 x 104 organisms i.p. Serum Ab responses to whole Listeria Ag and LLO were measured using the following ELISA protocols. To test for Ab to whole Listeria Ag, Nunc Maxisorp plates (Nunc, Roskilde, Denmark) were coated overnight at 4°C with 1 x 107/well live Listeria in 0.1 M carbonate buffer (pH 8.5). Plates were washed at each step with PBS plus 0.05% Tween 20, blocked with PBS plus 1% BSA for 1 h at room temperature, incubated with serum samples diluted in PBS plus 1% BSA for 2 h at room temperature, and then incubated with secondary Ab (goat anti-mouse IgG-peroxidase; Boehringer-Mannheim, Indianapolis, IN) diluted in PBS plus 1% BSA for 1 h at room temperature. Plates were then treated with 1 mM ABTS in citrate buffer with 0.05% H2O2, and OD 415 was measured. To test for Ab to LLO, an identical ELISA was performed, this time coating the plate initially with 100 ng/well histidine-tagged recombinant LLO (produced in Escherichia coli, a gift of Dr. Daniel Portnoy, University of California, Berkeley, CA (M. M. Gedde and D. A. Portnoy, unpublished observations)). To test whether polyclonal anti-Listeria Abs could provide protection against Listeria infection in vivo, serum was obtained from control CB.17 mice and Listeria immune mice (the same mice whose serum was tested above, serum taken 2 wk following a fourth infection with 1 x 104 Listeria i.p.). Serum was pooled, and crude Ig was obtained by precipitation in 50% saturated ammonium sulfate using standard methods. Naive CB.17 mice were administered 2 mg/mouse of control Ig or immune Ig 1 day before infection with 1 x 104 Listeria i.p. Mice were sacrificed at day 2 postinfection, and organ Listeria burden was assessed as described above.
Statistics
Data were analyzed using GraphPad PRISM software (Version 2.0, GraphPad Software, San Diego, CA). Survival curves were compared using the logrank test, and CFU determinations were compared using the Mann-Whitney test.
| Results |
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25 g).
Lower amounts resulted in much less of an effect. In no instance did we
find an effect of the control Ab of the same isotype. Representative
experiments are indicated in the figures. Fig. 1
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Anti-LLO provided resistance through the limitation of organ
Listeria growth during infection. CB.17 mice were
administered A4-8 or the control mAb 1 day before infection with 1
x 104 Listeria i.p. At day 2
postinfection, the mice treated with anti-LLO mAb had
100-fold
fewer CFU in the spleens and livers, a very dramatic reduction and the
likely explanation for how the Ab provided enhanced survival in the
previous experiments (Fig. 2
, B and C). When a
lower dose of Listeria was used (1 x
103) and mice were examined at day 4
postinfection, A4-8-treated mice had no detectable bacteria in the
spleen or liver (limit of detection 100 organisms/organ), while control
mAb-treated mice had geometric mean CFU of
104 Listeria/organ. A4-8 also affected
Listeria CFU at day 2 postinfection in mice infected with
Listeria i.v. (data not shown). In preliminary studies, a
nonneutralizing anti-LLO mAb was unable to affect
Listeria CFU during Listeria infection,
suggesting that neutralization of LLO is important for Ab-mediated
resistance. At day 2 postinfection following a dose of 1 x
104 Listeria i.p., mice treated with the
E4-3 nonneutralizing mAb to LLO (see Ref. 19) had
geometric mean CFU of 1.0 x 105Listeria/organ, while the control mAb-treated mice had geometric
mean CFU of 2.8 x 105 Listeria/organ.
In this same experiment, mice treated with A4-8 again had
100-fold
fewer CFU/organ, having a geometric mean CFU of 2.5 x
103 Listeria/organ.
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1 log in mice that received the A4-8 mAb
(Fig. 2
To investigate whether anti-LLO Abs are generated as part of the
normal immune response to Listeria infection, we performed
the following experiment. CB.17 mice were infected with
Listeria three times, each time with an increasing number of
organisms spaced 2 to 4 wk apart. Following the third infection, serum
Ab to LLO was measured in an ELISA assay with plate-bound
histidine-tagged recombinant LLO (Fig. 3
B). Ab responses were
minimal, with only a small fraction of the mice showing any
anti-LLO Ab at a serum dilution of 1/500. To determine whether the
Ab response to LLO was especially low compared with the Ab response to
other Listeria Ags, we tested these same serum samples for
Ab to whole Listeria Ag in a similar ELISA assay with
plate-bound Listeria (Fig. 3
A). While a few mice
showed detectable Ab at a serum dilution of 1/50, again very little Ab
was detectable at a serum dilution of 1/500. These results indicate
that Ab responses to Listeria Ags, including LLO, are very
low in mice following Listeria infection. The Ig from these
Listeria-immune mice did not confer passive protection to
Listeria (Fig. 3
C).
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| Discussion |
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Although Ab can clearly add a component of resistance to listeriosis, it is by no means an absolute requirement. Indeed CD4 and CD8 T cells can confer protective immunity without the need for Ab, a point exemplified in SCID mice, which clear infection after T cell transfer (20). Ab to LLO provided protection to SCID mice but did not allow for the complete clearance of the organism, indicating a necessity for T cells in mediating sterilizing immunity. Thus, we envision a cooperativity in listeriosis of different cells and soluble molecules (cytokines and Ab) to bring about complete resistance.
The surprising finding is that Ab can generate marked protection against listeriosis. Previous studies in which anti-Listeria serum was taken following infection or immunization with killed bacteria and then transferred to naive animals did not demonstrate protection against Listeria infection (2, 21, 22). Our experiments differ from previous studies with immune serum because we have utilized a defined mAb to a particular virulence factor, LLO. In infection models with other intracellular pathogens, mAbs have been shown to provide resistance when polyclonal serum could not (23). This has been explained to be due to a low abundance of serum Ab to protective Ags, or as a result of serum Ab being of an inappropriate isotype to mediate resistance.
Confirming the results of others, we found that the titer of anti-Listeria Abs, particularly anti-LLO Abs, during the normal infection of mice is limited (2, 24). This explains the failure to transfer protection with serum. Why LLO can elicit CD4 and CD8 T cell immunity but a weak B cell response may have to do with the fate of the intact LLO molecules and/or its particular biological features (25, 26). Overall, our studies demonstrate that an Ab to a secreted virulence factor of a facultative intracellular bacterium can provide resistance against infection, and open up the possibility for immunization with such virulence factors as a method for vaccination against intracellular pathogens.
| Acknowledgments |
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| Footnotes |
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2 Address correspondence and reprint requests to Dr. Emil R. Unanue, Department of Pathology, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63110. E-mail address: ![]()
3 Abbreviation used in this paper: LLO, listeriolysin O. ![]()
Received for publication July 13, 1999. Accepted for publication August 6, 1999.
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B and up-regulation of adhesion molecules and chemokines. Mol. Microbiol. 31:1709.[Medline]
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