Dissecting the Human Response to Staphylococcus aureus Systemic Infections.

Staphylococcus aureus is a common human commensal and the leading cause of diverse infections. To identify distinctive parameters associated with infection and colonization, we compared the immune and inflammatory responses of patients with a diagnosis of invasive S. aureus disease to healthy donors. We analyzed the inflammatory responses founding a pattern of distinctive cytokines significantly higher in the patients with invasive disease. The measure of antibody levels revealed a wide antibody responsiveness from all subjects to most of the antigens, with significantly higher response for some antigens in the invasive patients compared to control. Moreover, functional antibodies against toxins distinctively associated with the invasive disease. Finally, we examined the genomic variability of isolates, showing no major differences in genetic distribution compared to a panel of representative strains. Overall, our study shows specific signatures of cytokines and functional antibodies in patients with different primary invasive diseases caused by S. aureus. These data provide insight into human responses towards invasive staphylococcal infections and are important for guiding the identification of novel preventive and therapeutic interventions against S. aureus.

Human Organotypic Models for Anti-infective Research.

The use of human organotypic models for biomedical research is experiencing a significant increase due to their biological relevance, the possibility to perform high-throughput analyses, and their cost efficiency. In the field of anti-infective research, comprising the search for novel antipathogenic treatments including vaccines, efforts have been made to reduce the use of animal models. That is due to two main reasons: unreliability of data obtained with animal models and the increasing willingness to reduce the use of animals in research for ethical reasons. Human three-dimensional (3-D) models may substitute and/or complement in vivo studies, to increase the translational value of preclinical data. Here, we provide an overview of recent studies utilizing human organotypic models, resembling features of the cervix, intestine, lungs, brain, and skin in the context of anti-infective research. Furthermore, we focus on the future applications of human skin models and present methodological protocols to culture human skin equivalents and human skin explants.

Human Three-Dimensional Models for Studying Skin Pathogens.

Skin is the most exposed surface of the human body, separating the microbe-rich external environment, from the sterile inner part. When skin is breached or its homeostasis is perturbed, bacterial, fungal and viral pathogens can cause local infections or use the skin as an entry site to spread to other organs. In the last decades, it has become clear that skin provides niches for permanent microbial colonization, and it actively interacts with microorganisms. This crosstalk promotes skin homeostasis and immune maturation, preventing expansion of harmful organisms. Skin commensals, however, are often found to be skin most prevalent and dangerous pathogens. Despite the medical interest, mechanisms of colonization and invasion for most skin pathogens are poorly understood. This limitation is due to the lack of reliable skin models. Indeed, animal models do not adequately mimic neither the anatomy nor the immune response of human skin. Human 3D skin models overcome these limitations and can provide new insights into the molecular mechanisms of microbial pathogenesis. Herein, we address the strengths and weaknesses of different types of human skin models and we review the main findings obtained using these models to study skin pathogens.

Staphylococcus aureus-dependent septic arthritis in murine knee joints: local immune response and beneficial effects of vaccination.

Staphylococcus aureus is the major cause of human septic arthritis and osteomyelitis, which deserve special attention due to their rapid evolution and resistance to treatment. The progression of the disease depends on both bacterial presence in situ and uncontrolled disruptive immune response, which is responsible for chronic disease. Articular and bone infections are often the result of blood bacteremia, with the knees and hips being the most frequently infected joints showing the worst clinical outcome. We report the development of a hematogenous model of septic arthritis in murine knees, which progresses from an acute to a chronic phase, similarly to what occurs in humans. Characterization of the local and systemic inflammatory and immune responses following bacterial infection brought to light specific signatures of disease. Immunization of mice with the vaccine formulation we have recently described (4C-Staph), induced a strong antibody response and specific CD4+ effector memory T cells, and resulted in reduced bacterial load in the knee joints, a milder general inflammatory state and protection against bacterial-mediated cellular toxicity. Possible correlates of protection are finally proposed, which might contribute to the development of an effective vaccine for human use.

Typing of the pilus-protein-encoding FCT region and biofilm formation as novel parameters in epidemiological investigations of Streptococcus pyogenes isolates from various infection sites.

Streptococcus pyogenes is an important human pathogen for which an association between infection site and selected epidemiological or functional markers has previously been suggested. However, the studies involved often used strains with an insufficiently defined clinical background and laboratory history. Thus, the major goal of the present study was to investigate these relationships in 183 prospectively collected, well-defined, low-passage isolates from a North-East German centre for tertiary care. For each isolate the clinical background (91 respiratory, 71 skin and 21 invasive isolates) and antibiotic-resistance pattern was recorded. All isolates were classified according to their emm type, antibiotic-resistance and PFGE pattern ( SmaI restriction analysis of genomic DNA). As novel discriminatory methods we performed a PCR-based typing of the pilus-protein-encoding FCT region (FCT) and biofilm-formation phenotyping in various culture media. Forty-one isolates were found to be resistant to at least one of the tested antibiotics. emm typing revealed emm28, emm12 , emm1, emm4, emm89 and emm2 as the most frequent types in our collection. The novel FCT typing showed isolates encoding FCT types 4 and 2 to be the most common. Overall 113 strains with unique combinations of emm and FCT types, antibiotic-resistance and PFGE patterns were identified. The majority of all isolates revealed an association of biofilm-formation capacity with growth media. Comparing all results for potential associations, no correlation could be established between the anatomical site of isolation and the emm or the FCT type. There was no relationship between biofilm formation and emm type, antibiotic-resistance or PFGE patterns. However, a novel association between biofilm formation and FCT type became obvious among strains from our collection.