title: Immune proteomics of Staphylococcus aureus.
abstract: Immune proteomics is an increasingly powerful tool for the investigation of the adaptive immune response to natural encounters between micro-organisms and their hosts. The versatile species Staphylococcus aureus serves to illustrate how these techniques can be employed to appreciate the complexity and diversity of the host-pathogen interactions in unprecedented detail and completeness. Such knowledge is important for the development of effective vaccines as well as informative diagnostic and novel therapeutic tools. From high-resolution immune proteome studies, general rules underlying the human adaptive immune response to S. aureus colonization and infection are beginning to emerge against a background of extreme diversity: S. aureus carriers develop immune memory for their colonizing strain, but even non-carriers are frequently exposed to S. aureus, resulting in specific antibodies. During bacterial invasion, immune-competent individuals rapidly mount an antibody response to a large panel of S. aureus antigens. However, every patient starts from a personal baseline antibody profile reflecting his or her history of encounters with S. aureus.
authors.affiliation: Department of Immunology, University of Greifswald, Germany. broeker@uni-greifswald.de
authors.forename: Barbara M
authors.initials: BM
authors.lastname: Bröker
authors.forename: Alex
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: van Belkum
mesh_terms: D000907:Antibodies, Bacterial / Q000276:immunology*; D000942:Antigens, Bacterial / Q000276:immunology; D054884:Host-Pathogen Interactions / Q000276:immunology; D006801:Humans; D040901:Proteomics; D013203:Staphylococcal Infections / Q000276:immunology*; D013211:Staphylococcus aureus / Q000276:immunology*
chemical_list: D000907:Antibodies, Bacterial; D000942:Antigens, Bacterial