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Review

Uncovering the Hidden Credentials of Brucella Virulence

R. Martin Roop II, Ian S. Barton, Dariel Hopersberger, Daniel W. Martin
R. Martin Roop II
aDepartment of Microbiology and Immunology, Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, USA
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Ian S. Barton
aDepartment of Microbiology and Immunology, Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, USA
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Dariel Hopersberger
aDepartment of Microbiology and Immunology, Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, USA
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Daniel W. Martin
aDepartment of Microbiology and Immunology, Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, USA
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DOI: 10.1128/MMBR.00021-19
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SUMMARY

Bacteria in the genus Brucella are important human and veterinary pathogens. The abortion and infertility they cause in food animals produce economic hardships in areas where the disease has not been controlled, and human brucellosis is one of the world’s most common zoonoses. Brucella strains have also been isolated from wildlife, but we know much less about the pathobiology and epidemiology of these infections than we do about brucellosis in domestic animals. The brucellae maintain predominantly an intracellular lifestyle in their mammalian hosts, and their ability to subvert the host immune response and survive and replicate in macrophages and placental trophoblasts underlies their success as pathogens. We are just beginning to understand how these bacteria evolved from a progenitor alphaproteobacterium with an environmental niche and diverged to become highly host-adapted and host-specific pathogens. Two important virulence determinants played critical roles in this evolution: (i) a type IV secretion system that secretes effector molecules into the host cell cytoplasm that direct the intracellular trafficking of the brucellae and modulate host immune responses and (ii) a lipopolysaccharide moiety which poorly stimulates host inflammatory responses. This review highlights what we presently know about how these and other virulence determinants contribute to Brucella pathogenesis. Gaining a better understanding of how the brucellae produce disease will provide us with information that can be used to design better strategies for preventing brucellosis in animals and for preventing and treating this disease in humans.

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Uncovering the Hidden Credentials of Brucella Virulence
R. Martin Roop II, Ian S. Barton, Dariel Hopersberger, Daniel W. Martin
Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews Feb 2021, 85 (1) e00021-19; DOI: 10.1128/MMBR.00021-19

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Uncovering the Hidden Credentials of Brucella Virulence
R. Martin Roop II, Ian S. Barton, Dariel Hopersberger, Daniel W. Martin
Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews Feb 2021, 85 (1) e00021-19; DOI: 10.1128/MMBR.00021-19
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  • Article
    • SUMMARY
    • INTRODUCTION
    • VIRULENCE DETERMINANTS ACTING AT THE HOST-PATHOGEN INTERFACE
    • PHYSIOLOGIC ADAPTATION TO THE HOST ENVIRONMENT
    • REGULATION OF VIRULENCE GENE EXPRESSION
    • CONCLUDING REMARKS
    • ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
    • REFERENCES
    • Author Bios
  • Figures & Data
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KEYWORDS

Brucella
pathogenesis
virulence determinants

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