Abstract
Mycoplasma infections, such as walking pneumonia or pelvic inflammatory diseases, are a major threat to public health. Despite their relatively small physical and genomic size, mycoplasmas are known to elicit strong host immune responses, generally inflammatory, while also being able to evade the immune system. The mycoplasma membrane is composed of approximately two-thirds protein and one-third lipid and contains several lipoproteins that are known to regulate host immune responses. Herein, the immunomodulatory effects of mycoplasma lipoproteins are reviewed. A better understanding of the immunomodulatory effects, both activating and evasive, of Mycoplasma surface lipoproteins will contribute to understanding mechanisms potentially relevant to mycoplasma disease vaccine development and treatment.
Highlights
Mycoplasmas cause a wide variety of human disease, such as asthma, bronchiectasis, and pelvic inflammatory diseases (Metaxas et al, 2015)
Analysis of the mycoplasmal cell membrane demonstrated that several lipoprotein surface antigens elicit strong immune responses (Muhlradt et al, 1997) through a distinct pathway than that seen with lipopolysaccharides (Rawadi and Roman-Roman, 1996)
The M. pneumoniae/IL-8/neutrophil axis likely plays a vital role in the pathogenesis of MPP and mycoplasmas directly induce in vitro production of chemotactic cytokines such as IL-8 by bronchial epithelial cells (Chambaud et al, 1999; Peng et al, 2007; Chen et al, 2016)
Summary
Mycoplasmas cause a wide variety of human disease, such as asthma, bronchiectasis, and pelvic inflammatory diseases (Metaxas et al, 2015). Mycoplasmal lipoproteins may have a major role in regulation of the cytokine response in respiratory epithelial cells during M. pneumoniae infection (Eckmann et al, 1995; Yang et al, 2002). The initial release of proinflammatory cytokines and chemokines by epithelial cells infected by Mycoplasmas can induce early recruitment of immune cells such as neutrophils.
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