Treponema pallidum attachment to surface and matrix proteins of cultured rabbit epithelial cells.
Treponema pallidum strain Nichols adheres readily to rabbit epithelial cells (SF1Ep) in tissue culture. We examined a variety of sugars for their ability to inhibit attachment. Mannose, galactose, and N-acetylgalactosamine showed minor but reproducible inhibition of attachment at high concentrations, whereas sialic acid was highly inhibitory even at low concentrations. Whole-cell lysates of SF1Ep cells contained a large number of glycoproteins, which might be related to the sialic acid-inhibitable attachment. When the cells and extracellular matrix were fractionated, only a few proteins were found in the matrix fraction. They included a 220-kilodalton (kDa) protein, shown by immunoblotting to be fibronectin, and an approximately 90-kDa protein (both were isolated on SDS-PAGE gels). When nitrocellulose replicas of these SDS-PAGE gels were exposed to 125I-labeled T. pallidum, adherence was mainly to the 90-kDa protein.
D000818:Animals; D001422:Bacterial Adhesion / Q000187:drug effects; D002241:Carbohydrates / Q000494:pharmacology; D002460:Cell Line; D004848:Epithelium / Q000382:microbiology; D005109:Extracellular Matrix / Q000382:microbiology*; D005353:Fibronectins / Q000378:metabolism*; D011506:Proteins / Q000378:metabolism*; D011817:Rabbits; D012794:Sialic Acids / Q000494:pharmacology; D014210:Treponema pallidum / Q000378:metabolism*
D002241:Carbohydrates; D005353:Fibronectins; D011506:Proteins; D012794:Sialic Acids