Comparative transcriptional and translational analysis of Bordetella pertussis Tohama I reference strain and clinical isolates growing in biofilm

ARNAL LAURA; NATALIA CATTELAN; TOM GRUNERT; ANABEL ALVAREZ ; MARÍA INÉS VILLALBA; DIÓGENES QUINTANA VAZQUEZ; GERARDO GUILL{EN; MONIKA EHLING-SCHULZ; OSVALDO M YANTORNO

Varadero, Memories Varadero Hotel, Cuba

Congreso; OMICS Varadero 2014, International Meeting on OMICs and Bioinformatics; 2014

Centro de Ingeniería Genética y Biotecnología (CIGB), La Habana, Cuba

Comparative transcriptional and translational analysis of Bordetella pertussis Tohama I reference strain and clinical isolates growing in biofilm Laura Arnal1, Natalia Cattelan1, Tom Grunert2, Anabel Alvarez Acosta3, María Inés Villalba1, Diógenes Quintana Vazquez3, Gerardo Guillén Nieto3, Monika Ehling-Schulz2 and Osvaldo Yantorno1. 1Centro de Investigación y Desarrollo de Fermentaciones Industriales (CINDEFI-CONICET), 50 No 227; Facultad de Ciencias Exactas, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, La Plata (1900), Argentina; 2Institute of Microbiology, Department of Pathobiology, University of Veterinary Medicine, Veterinärplatz 1, A-1210, Vienna, Austria; 3División de Vacunas, Centro de Ingeniería Genética y Biotecnología (CIGB), La Habana, Cuba Abstract Bordetella pertussis is a strict human pathogen and the primary etiological agent of whooping cough or pertussis, a respiratory disease that is highly prevalent among infants. After widespread use of vaccines from the 1950´s the incidence of the disease decreased noticeably. However, in the last decades pertussis has become re-emergent with significant mortality in infants. Clearly, the efficacy of current vaccines, formulated from bacteria grown in stirred bioreactors is limited, showing the need to develop a new generation of vaccines. Physiological and pathogenic features of B. pertussis have been extensively studied focusing on the planktonic mode of growth, while only a few works so far have considered the biofilm lifestyle of this bacterial pathogen. With the hypothesis that B. pertussis colonizes and persists in their host through biofilm formation, in this work we examined biofilm forming capacity of eight clinical Argentineans isolates recovered from 2001 to 2007, against the reference strain Tohama I (a strain sub-cultured in vitro since 1950s). Clinical isolates showed higher ability to grow as biofilm compared to the Tohama I strain. Transcriptional and translational analysis of the isolate B. pertussis 2723, an isolate with high biofilm biomass production capacity, showed elevated expression of several virulence factors regulated by BvgAS system, including adhesins involved in biofilm development. In addition, a high expression of energy metabolism enzymes in the clinical isolate was observed. These results were associated with the consumption of the carbon and nitrogen source (glutamate) in the culture medium. In conclusion, the biofilm development has a distinctive impact on B. pertussis physiology indicating that it might be considered for the formulation of novel vaccines.