Staphylococcus aureus exhibit similarities in their interactions with Acanthamoeba and ThP1 macrophage-like cells

Abstract

Staphylococcus aureus is a leading cause of nosocomial infections. Haematogenous spread is a pre-requisite but it is not clear how S. aureus survive the onslaught of macrophages. Acanthamoeba is a protozoan pathogen that is remarkably similar to macrophages, particularly in their cellular structure (morphological and ultra-structural features), molecular motility, biochemical physiology, ability to capture prey by phagocytosis and interactions with microbial pathogens. Thus, we hypothesize that S. aureus exhibit similarities in their interactions with Acanthamoeba and ThP1 macrophage-like cells. Here, we studied interactions of methicillin-sensitive S. aureus (MSSA), methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) and Staphylococcus epidermidis (SE) with Acanthamoeba castellanii belonging to the T4 genotype and macrophage-like cells (ThP1). The findings revealed that both MRSA and MSSA exhibited similarities in their binding/association and invasion of A. castellanii and ThP1 cells. Long-term incubation showed that MRSA and MSSA can survive intracellularly of both Acanthamoeba and ThP1 cells. Overall, these findings suggest that Acanthamoeba exhibit similar characteristics with ThP1 macrophage-like cells in their interaction with MRSA and MSSA. Additionally it was shown that bacteria survive inside Acanthamoeba during the encystment process as evidenced by bacterial recovery from mature cysts. Given that Acanthamoeba cysts are airborne, these findings suggest that cysts may act as "Trojan horse" to help spread MRSA to susceptible hosts.