Expression of virulence factors under different environmental conditions in Aggregatibacter actinomycetemcomitans

Abstract

Aggregatibacter actinomycetemcomitans is a facultative anaerobic Gram‐negative bacterium associated with periodontal diseases, especially aggressive periodontitis. The virulence factors of this pathogen, including adhesins, exotoxins, and endotoxin, have been extensively studied. However, little is known about their gene expression mode in the host. Herein, we investigated whether culture conditions reflecting in vivo environments, including serum and saliva, alter expression levels of virulence genes in the strain HK1651, a JP2 clone. Under aerobic conditions, addition of calf serum (CS) into a general medium induced high expression of two outer membrane proteins (omp100 and omp64). The high expression of omp100 and omp64 was also induced by an iron‐limited medium. RNA‐seq analysis showed that the gene expressions of several factors involved in iron acquisition were increased in the CS‐containing medium. When HK1651 was grown on agar plates, genes encoding many virulence factors, including the Omps, cytolethal distending toxin, and leukotoxin, were differentially expressed. Then, we investigated their expression in five other A. actinomycetemcomitans strains grown in general and CS‐containing media. The expression pattern of virulence factors varied among strains. Compared with the other five strains, HK1561 showed high expression of omp29 regardless of the CS addition, while the gene expression of leukotoxin in HK1651 was higher only in the medium without CS. HK1651 showed reduced biofilm in both CS‐ and saliva‐containing media. Coaggregation with Fusobacterium nucleatum was remarkably enhanced using HK1651 grown in the CS‐containing medium. Our results indicate that the expression of virulence factors is altered by adaptation to different conditions during infection.