Influence of pCP1NetB ancillary genes on the virulence of Clostridium perfringens poultry necrotic enteritis strain CP1

Necrotic enteritis (NE) is an economically important disease of poultry caused by certain type A strains. The NetB toxin plays a critical role in the pathogenesis of NE. We previously demonstrated that is located within a 42 kb plasmid-encoded pathogenicity locus (NELoc-1), which also encodes 36 add...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Gut pathogens 2017-01, Vol.9 (1), p.6, Article 6
Main Authors: Zhou, Hongzhuan, Lepp, Dion, Pei, Yanlong, Liu, Mei, Yin, Xianhua, Ma, Rongcai, Prescott, John F, Gong, Joshua
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Chickens
Clostridium
Diseases
Genetic aspects
Health aspects
Poultry diseases
Risk factors
Short Report
Toxins
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Summary:Necrotic enteritis (NE) is an economically important disease of poultry caused by certain type A strains. The NetB toxin plays a critical role in the pathogenesis of NE. We previously demonstrated that is located within a 42 kb plasmid-encoded pathogenicity locus (NELoc-1), which also encodes 36 additional genes. Although NetB clearly plays a role in pathogenesis, the involvement of the other NELoc-1 genes has not yet been established. The current study was to provide experimental evidence to confirm the involvement of these genes in NE pathogenesis. The present study has characterized a virulent strain (CP1) that has spontaneously lost the NELoc-1-encoding plasmid, pCP1netB. When assessed for cytotoxicity on Leghorn Male Hepatoma (LMH) cells, the culture supernatant of the pCP1netB-deficient CP1 variant (CP1ΔpCP1netB) demonstrated significantly reduced cytotoxicity compared to the wild-type. In addition, CP1ΔpCP1netB was unable to cause intestinal lesions in chickens in a NE disease model. When alone was introduced into CP1ΔpCP1netB, in vitro cytotoxicity was restored to the wild-type level; however, it did not completely restore virulence when used to challenge broiler chickens [mean lesion score of 0.71 compared to 3.23 in the wild type control group (n = 14)]. The results of this study suggest that other genes present in NELoc-1, in addition to , are required for full virulence in the chicken challenge model.
ISSN:1757-4749
1757-4749
DOI:10.1186/s13099-016-0152-y