GSBS Student Publications
GSBS Program
Not applicable
Publication Date
2011-11-08
UMMS Affiliation
Department of Microbiology and Physiological Systems
Document Type
Article
Disciplines
Microbiology
Abstract
A member of the attaching and effacing (AE) family of pathogens, enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli (EHEC) induces dramatic changes to the intestinal cell cytoskeleton, including effacement of microvilli. Effacement by the related pathogen enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC) requires the activity of the Ca(+2)-dependent host protease, calpain, which participates in a variety of cellular processes, including cell adhesion and motility. We found that EHEC infection results in an increase in epithelial (CaCo-2a) cell calpain activity and that EHEC-induced microvillar effacement was blocked by ectopic expression of calpastatin, an endogenous calpain inhibitor, or by pretreatment of intestinal cells with a cell-penetrating version of calpastatin. In addition, ezrin, a known calpain substrate that links the plasma membrane to axial actin filaments in microvilli, was cleaved in a calpain-dependent manner during EHEC infection and lost from its normal locale within microvilli. Calpain may be a central conduit through which EHEC and other AE pathogens induce enterocyte cytoskeletal remodeling and exert their pathogenic effects.
Keywords
CaCo-2, calpastat, calpastatin, ezrin, attaching and effacing lesion, microvilli
Rights and Permissions
Copyright © 2011 Lai, Riley, Cai, Leong and Herman. This is an open-access article subject to a non-exclusive license between the authors and Frontiers Media SA, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in other forums, provided the original authors and source are credited and other Frontiers conditions are complied with.
DOI of Published Version
10.3389/fmicb.2011.00222
Source
Front Microbiol. 2011 Nov 8;2:222. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2011.00222. eCollection 2011. Link to article on publisher's site
Journal/Book/Conference Title
Frontiers in microbiology
Related Resources
PubMed ID
22073041
Repository Citation
Lai, YuShuan (Cindy); Riley, Kathleen; Cai, Andrew; Leong, John M.; and Herman, Ira M., "Calpain mediates epithelial cell microvillar effacement by enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli" (2011). GSBS Student Publications. 2045.
https://escholarship.umassmed.edu/gsbs_sp/2045