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Escherichia coli Infections in Humans and Animals

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A special issue of Pathogens (ISSN 2076-0817). This special issue belongs to the section "Bacterial Pathogens".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (28 February 2021) | Viewed by 13130

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Special Issue Editor

Dr. Grégory Jubelin

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Guest Editor

UMR0454 MEDIS, National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAe), University of Clermont Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand, France
Interests: pathogenic or commensal E. coli; virulence factors; toxins; gene regulation; E. coli interactions with the host or the gut microbiota
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Escherichia coli is the predominant facultative anaerobe of the gut microbiota of humans and other warm-blooded animals. If most strains are harmless, some others can cause intestinal or extra-intestinal diseases with various degree of symptoms. Genome plasticity is a hallmark of E. coli, and the emergence of pathogenic strains is related to the acquisition of virulence and/or fitness factors encoding genes by horizontal gene transfer. The focus of this Special Issue of Pathogens will be on the pathogenicity of intestinal pathogenic E. coli (InPEC) and extra-intestinal pathogenic E. coli (ExPEC) of humans and animals. We encourage submissions of original research articles and review articles, related to:

Molecular basis on infection;
Virulence factors and transmission;
Host–pathogen and gut microbiota–pathogen interactions;
Host adaptation and gene regulation;
Antibiotic resistance;
Epidemiology;
Prevention and control;
Curative treatments;
Other aspects related to coli pathogenesis.

Dr. Grégory Jubelin
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Pathogens is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

enteropathogenic E. coli
enterohemorrhagic E. coli
enterotoxigenic E. coli
enteroaggregative E. coli
enteroinvasive E. coli
diffusely adherent E. coli
adherent and invasive E. coli
uropathogenic E. coli
meningitis-sepsis-associated E. coli

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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11 pages, 2521 KiB

Open AccessCommunication

Hybrid Atypical Enteropathogenic and Extraintestinal Escherichia coli (aEPEC/ExPEC) BA1250 Strain: A Draft Genome

by Danielle D. Munhoz, Fernanda F. Santos, Thais Mitsunari, Paulo A. Schüroff, Waldir P. Elias, Eneas Carvalho and Roxane M. F. Piazza

Pathogens 2021, 10(4), 475; https://doi.org/10.3390/pathogens10040475 - 14 Apr 2021

Cited by 8 | Viewed by 2374

Abstract

Diarrheagenic Escherichia coli is the major bacterial etiological agent of severe diarrhea and a major concern of public health. These pathogens have acquired genetic characteristics from other pathotypes, leading to unusual and singular genetic combinations, known as hybrid strains and may be more virulent due to a set of virulence factors from more than one pathotype. One of the possible combinations is with extraintestinal E. coli (ExPEC), a leading cause of urinary tract infection, often lethal after entering the bloodstream and atypical enteropathogenic E. coli (aEPEC), responsible for death of thousands of people every year, mainly children under five years old. Here we report the draft genome of a strain originally classified as aEPEC (BA1250) isolated from feces of a child with acute diarrhea. Phylogenetic analysis indicates that BA1250 genome content is genetically closer to E. coli strains that cause extraintestinal infections, other than intestinal infections. A deeper analysis showed that in fact this is a hybrid strain, due to the presence of a set of genes typically characteristic of ExPEC. These genomic findings expand our knowledge about aEPEC heterogeneity allowing further studies concerning E. coli pathogenicity and may be a source for future comparative studies, virulence characteristics, and evolutionary biology. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Escherichia coli Infections in Humans and Animals)

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13 pages, 4554 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Bloodstream Infections Caused by Extended-Spectrum Beta-Lactamase-Producing Escherichia coli in Patients with Liver Cirrhosis

by Wen-Chi Chen, Chih-Hsin Hung, Yao-Shen Chen, Jin-Shiung Cheng, Susan Shin-Jung Lee, Fan-Chen Tseng, Ming-Fang Cheng and Jiun-Ling Wang

Pathogens 2021, 10(1), 37; https://doi.org/10.3390/pathogens10010037 - 5 Jan 2021

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2060

Abstract

Background: This study aimed to investigate the frequency of sequence type (ST) 131 strains and outcome of cirrhotic patients with bloodstream infections (BSIs) caused by extended-spectrum beta-lactamase-producing Escherichiacoli (ESBLEC) and non-extended-spectrum beta-lactamase-producing Escherichiacoli (NESBLEC). Methods: The incidence of ST 131 strains, hospital stay, and 30-day re-admission/mortality were compared between 51 ESBLEC and 51 NESBLEC bacteremic patients with cirrhosis. Results: ST 131 strains were found in 35.3% of the ESBLEC group and 0% of the NESBLEC group (p < 0.001). Mean hospital stay was 26.5 days in the ESBLEC group and 17.1 days in the NESBLEC group (p = 0.006). Thirty-day re-admission rates were 11.8% in the ESBLEC group and 5.9% in the NESBLEC group (p = 0.5). ST 131 strains were associated with 30-day re-admission (odds ratio: 4.5, 95% confidence interval: 1.1–18.9). Thirty-day mortality rate was 31.4% in the ESBLEC group and 23.5% in the NESBLEC group (p = 0.4). Conclusion: In patients with cirrhosis, the ESBLEC BSIs group had a higher frequency of ST 131 strains and longer hospital stay than the NESBLEC BSIs group with similar 30-day re-admission/mortality. ST 131 strains were associated with 30-day re-admission. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Escherichia coli Infections in Humans and Animals)

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14 pages, 1229 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Role of the Nitric Oxide Reductase NorVW in the Survival and Virulence of Enterohaemorrhagic Escherichia coli during Infection

by Marion Gardette, Julien Daniel, Estelle Loukiadis and Grégory Jubelin

Pathogens 2020, 9(9), 683; https://doi.org/10.3390/pathogens9090683 - 21 Aug 2020

Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2347

Abstract

Enterohaemorrhagic Escherichia coli (EHEC) are bacterial pathogens responsible for life-threatening diseases in humans, such as hemolytic and uremic syndrome. It has been previously demonstrated that the interplay between EHEC and nitric oxide (NO), a mediator of the host immune innate response, is critical for infection outcome, since NO affects both Shiga toxin (Stx) production and adhesion to enterocytes. In this study, we investigated the role of the NO reductase NorVW in the virulence and fitness of two EHEC strains in a murine model of infection. We determined that the deletion of norVW in the strain O91:H21 B2F1 has no impact on its virulence, whereas it reduces the ability of the strain O157:H7 620 to persist in the mouse gut and to produce Stx. We also revealed that the fitness defect of strain 620 ΔnorVW is strongly attenuated when mice are treated with an NO synthase inhibitor. Altogether, these results demonstrate that the NO reductase NorVW participates in EHEC resistance against NO produced by the host and promotes virulence through the modulation of Stx synthesis. The contribution of NorVW in the EHEC infectious process is, however, strain-dependent and suggests that the EHEC response to nitrosative stress is complex and multifactorial. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Escherichia coli Infections in Humans and Animals)

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Review

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23 pages, 1417 KiB

Open AccessReview

Bacteriophages of Shiga Toxin-Producing Escherichia coli and Their Contribution to Pathogenicity

by Lorena Rodríguez-Rubio, Nadja Haarmann, Maike Schwidder, Maite Muniesa and Herbert Schmidt

Pathogens 2021, 10(4), 404; https://doi.org/10.3390/pathogens10040404 - 29 Mar 2021

Cited by 41 | Viewed by 5551

Abstract

Shiga toxins (Stx) of Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) are generally encoded in the genome of lambdoid bacteriophages, which spend the most time of their life cycle integrated as prophages in specific sites of the bacterial chromosome. Upon spontaneous induction or induction by chemical or physical stimuli, the stx genes are co-transcribed together with the late phase genes of the prophages. After being assembled in the cytoplasm, and after host cell lysis, mature bacteriophage particles are released into the environment, together with Stx. As members of the group of lambdoid phages, Stx phages share many genetic features with the archetypical temperate phage Lambda, but are heterogeneous in their DNA sequences due to frequent recombination events. In addition to Stx phages, the genome of pathogenic STEC bacteria may contain numerous prophages, which are either cryptic or functional. These prophages may carry foreign genes, some of them related to virulence, besides those necessary for the phage life cycle. Since the production of one or more Stx is considered the major pathogenicity factor of STEC, we aim to highlight the new insights on the contribution of Stx phages and other STEC phages to pathogenicity. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Escherichia coli Infections in Humans and Animals)

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