Novel Detection Strategy To Rapidly Evaluate the Efficacy of Antichlamydial Agents

Chlamydia trachomatis infections present a major heath burden worldwide. The conventional method used to detectC. trachomatis is laborious. In the present study, a novel strategy was utilized to evaluate the impact of antimicrobial agents on the growth ofC. trachomatis and its expression ofompA promoter-driven green fluorescence protein (GFP). We demonstrate that this GFP reporter system gives a robust fluorescent display ofC. trachomatis growth in human cervical epithelial cells and, further, that GFP production directly correlates to changes inompA expression following sufficient exposure to antimicrobials. Validation with azithromycin, the first-line macrolide drug used for the treatment ofC. trachomatis infection, highlights the advantages of this method over the traditional method because of its simplicity and versatility. The results indicate both thatompA is highly responsive to antimicrobials targeting the transcription and translation ofC. trachomatis and that there is a correlation between changing GFP levels andC. trachomatis growth. This proof-of-concept study also reveals that theompA -GFP system can be easily adapted to rapidly assess antimicrobial effectiveness in a high-throughput format.