Open AccessEndothelial cells are intrinsically defective in xenophagy of Streptococcus pyogenes
Author(s) -
Shiou Ling Lu,
Tsuyoshi Kawabata,
Yi Lin Cheng,
Hiroko Omori,
Maho Hamasaki,
Tatsuya Kusaba,
Ryo Iwamoto,
Hirokazu Arimoto,
Takeshi Noda,
Yee Shin Lin,
Tamotsu Yoshimori
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
plos pathogens
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.719
H-Index - 206
eISSN - 1553-7374
pISSN - 1553-7366
DOI - 10.1371/journal.ppat.1006444
Subject(s) - autophagy , microbiology and biotechnology , ubiquitin , biology , biogenesis , endothelial stem cell , streptococcus pyogenes , bacteria , biochemistry , apoptosis , genetics , gene , in vitro , staphylococcus aureus
Group A Streptococcus (GAS) is deleterious pathogenic bacteria whose interaction with blood vessels leads to life-threatening bacteremia. Although xenophagy, a special form of autophagy, eliminates invading GAS in epithelial cells, we found that GAS could survive and multiply in endothelial cells. Endothelial cells were competent in starvation-induced autophagy, but failed to form double-membrane structures surrounding GAS, an essential step in xenophagy. This deficiency stemmed from reduced recruitment of ubiquitin and several core autophagy proteins in endothelial cells, as demonstrated by the fact that it could be rescued by exogenous coating of GAS with ubiquitin. The defect was associated with reduced NO-mediated ubiquitin signaling. Therefore, we propose that the lack of efficient clearance of GAS in endothelial cells is caused by their intrinsic inability to target GAS with ubiquitin to promote autophagosome biogenesis for xenophagy.