Sustained release of alginate hydrogel containing antimicrobial peptide Chol-37(F34-R) in vitro and its effect on wound healing in murine model of Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection

Background@#Antibiotic resistance is a significant public health concern around the globe.Antimicrobial peptides exhibit broad-spectrum and efficient antibacterial activity with an added advantage of low drug resistance. The higher water content and 3D network structure of the hydrogels are beneficial for maintaining antimicrobial peptide activity and help to prevent degradation. The antimicrobial peptide released from hydrogels also hasten the local wound healing by promoting epithelial tissue regeneration and granulation tissue formation. @*Objective@#This study aimed at developing sodium alginate based hydrogel loaded with a novel antimicrobial peptide Chol-37(F34-R) and to investigate the characteristics in vitro and in vivo as an alternative antibacterial wound dressing to treat infectious wounds. @*Methods@#Hydrogels were developed and optimized by varying the concentrations of crosslinkers and subjected to various characterization tests like cross-sectional morphology, swelling index, percent water contents, water retention ratio, drug release and antibacterial activity in vitro, and Pseudomonas aeruginosa infected wound mice model in vivo. @*Results@#The results indicated that the hydrogel C proved superior in terms of cross-sectional morphology having uniformly sized interconnected pores, a good swelling index, with the capacity to retain a higher quantity of water. Furthermore, the optimized hydrogel has been found to exert a significant antimicrobial activity against bacteria and was also found to prevent bacterial infiltration into the wound site due to forming an impermeable barrier between the wound bed and external environment. The optimized hydrogel was found to significantly hasten skin regeneration in animal models when compared to other treatments in addition to strong inhibitory effect on the release of pro-inflammatory cytokines (interleukin-1β and tumor necrosis factor-α). @*Conclusions@#Our results suggest that sodium alginate -based hydrogels loaded with Chol-37(F34-R) hold the potential to be used as an alternative to conventional antibiotics in treating infectious skin wounds.

Comparison of immunoadjuvant activities of four bursal peptides combined with H9N2 avian influenza virus vaccine

The bursa of Fabricius (BF) is a central humoral immune organ unique to birds. Four bursal peptides (BP-I, BP-II, BP-III, and BP-IV) have been isolated and identified from the BF. In this study, the immunoadjuvant activities of BPs I to IV were examined in mice immunized with H9N2 avian influenza virus (AIV) vaccine. The results suggested that BP-I effectively enhanced cell-mediated immune responses, increased the secretion of Th1 (interferon gamma)- and Th2 (interleukin-4)-type cytokines, and induced an improved cytotoxic T-lymphocyte (CTL) response to the H9N2 virus. BP-II mainly elevated specific antibody production, especially neutralizing antibodies, and increased Th1- and Th2-type cytokine secretion. BP-III had no significant effect on antibody production or cell-mediated immune responses compared to those in the control group. A strong immune response at both the humoral and cellular levels was induced by BP-IV. Furthermore, a virus challenge experiment followed by H&E staining revealed that BP-I and BP-II promoted removal of the virus and conferred protection in mouse lungs. BP-IV significantly reduced viral titers and histopathological changes and contributed to protection against H9N2 AIV challenge in mouse lungs. This study further elucidated the immunoadjuvant activities of BPs I to IV, providing a novel insight into immunoadjuvants for use in vaccine design.

Nuclease activity of the recombinant plancitoxin-1-like proteins with mutations in the active site from Trichinella spiralis / 生物工程学报

Although there are 125 predicted DNase Ⅱ-like family genes in the Trichinella spiralis genome, plancitoxin-1-like (Ts-Pt) contains the HKD motif, a typical conserved region of DNase Ⅱ, in N- and C-terminal. It is generally believed that histidine is the active site in DNase Ⅱ. To study the nuclease activity of recombinant Ts-Pt with mutations in the active site from T. spiralis, different fragments of the mutated Ts-Pt genes were cloned using overlap PCR technique and inserted into the expressing vector pET-28a(+), and transformed into Escherichia coli Rosseta (DE3). The fusion proteins were purified by Ni-NTA affinity chromatography and SDS-PAGE. Nuclease activity of the recombinant proteins was detected by agarose gel electrophoresis and nuclease-zymography. The recombinant plasmids harboring the mutated Ts-Pt genes were constructed and expressed as inclusive body in a prokaryotic expression system. After renaturation in vitro, the recombinant proteins had no nuclease activity according to agarose gel electrophoresis. However, the expressed proteins as inclusive body displayed the ability to degrade DNA after renaturation in gel. And the nuclease activity was not affected after subjected to mutation of active site in N- and C-termini of Ts-Pt. These results provide the basis to study the relationship between DNase Ⅱ-like protein family and infection of T. spiralis.

Sequence analysis, prokaryotic expression and purification of Salmonella typhimurium Ssek3 protein / 中华微生物学和免疫学杂志

Objective To study the sequence structure of Salmonella typhimurium Ssek3 gene and to express it at protein level in a prokaryotic expression system .Methods Sequence of Ssek3 gene was ob-tained from Salmonella typhimurium SL1344 strain.Bioinformatics methods were used for systematic analy-sis .A prokaryotic expression system for expressing Sse3k gene was constructed and the expressed protein was purified by Ni-NTA affinity chromatography .Results Sequence analysis showed that the Ssek3 gene of Sal-monella typhimurium was 1008 bp in length, encoding a protein of 335 amino acids and 72 amino acid resi-dues.The molecular weight, molecular formula and isoelectric point of Ssek3 protein was 37.89×103, C1700 H2629 N463 O497 S12 and 6.7, which indicated that it was a stable and hydrophilic protein .Ssek3 protein was a membrane protein without signal peptide or transmembrane region , containing five N-glycosylation sites , three O-glycosylation sites , 33 phosphorylation sites , 22 linear B-cell epitopes , 11 T-cell epitopes and 21 di-sulfide bonds.The secondary structure of Ssek3 protein contained 114 α-helices (Hh) (34.03％), 72 ex-tended chain (Ee) (21.49％), 30β-sheets (Tt) (8.96％) and 119 random coils (Cc) (35.52％).Re-sults of SDS-PAGE showed that the fusion protein Ssek 3 expressed in the prokaryotic expression system was a secretory protein with a molecular weight of about 40×103 .Conclusion The Ssek3 gene of Salmonella typh-imurium is successfully cloned , sequenced and expressed in this study , which will lay a foundation for fur-ther studying the role of Ssek3 protein in host cells during Salmonella typhimurium infection.

Construction and characterization of type III secretion system of attenuated Salmonella typhimurium / 生物工程学报

In order to develop a recombinant attenuated Salmonella typhimurium as oral live vaccine vector, we constructed recombinant plasmid pYA-sopENt100 by replacing the trc promoter with the sopE promoter and secretion signal sequence sopENt100 of Salmonella typhimurium on the basis of plasmid pYA3493. Then, the complementary plasmid pYA-sopENt100 was transformed into ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 by electroporation to generate attenuated Salmonella typhimurium type III secretion system ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100). We further characterized ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100). We also constructed a recombinant strain ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100-egfp) that harbored the reporter gene-enhanced green fluorescent protein (egfp) gene. Vero cells were infected with ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100-egfp) and the ability of delivery foreign antigens was tested via Western blotting analysis. The results of PCR, enzyme digestion and sequencing showed that the ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100) type III secretion system was constructed successfully. The serotype of ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100) was identical to ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 and SL1344. Compared with wild strain SL1344, the biochemical characteristics of ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100) had obvious change, but it was basically the same with ΔcrpΔasdSL1344. The growth speed was much slower than that of the wild strain SL1344. The chicken virulence test (LD₅₀) showed that the virulence of ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100) was 7×10⁴ times lower than SL1344. In addition, we observed the 37 kDa SopENt100-egfp protein in the cultured supernatant of ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100-egfp) strain by Western blotting analysis. However, both the 37 kDa SopENt100-egfp protein and 27 kDa EGFP protein were detected in ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100-egfp)-infected Vero cells. These results demonstrated that the recombinant Salmonella typhimurium type III secretion system ΔcrpΔasdSL1344 (pYA-sopENt100) was successfully constructed, and it should be used as a live vaccine vector for expressing foreign genes.

Construction and characterization of invasion protein B gene deleted mutant asd host-vector balanced lethal system / 中国免疫学杂志

Objective: To develop an oral live vaccine vector which stably carries exogenous genes.Methods:SL1344ΔsipBΔasd host-vector balanced lethal system was constructed by the method of recombinant suicide plasmid-mediated allelic exchange on the basis of attenuated Salmonella typhinurium SL1344ΔsipB.Then,the biological characteristics of SL1344ΔsipBΔasd was analyzed.Results:The results showed that the mutant was stabile with the Δasd gene in vitro;the serotype and growth rate of SL1344ΔsipBΔasd strain was almost same as the parent SL1344ΔsipB and SL1344 strain.And the mutant strains remain swim ming zones.Virulence test in mice showed that the virulence of SL1344ΔsipBΔasd which carried complementary plasmid pYA3493 by electro-transformation decreased by 1.4%compared with SL1344.Conclusion: These results showed that the SL1344ΔsipBΔasd mutant was successfully constructed.It is likely that this mutant should be used as a live vector to express foreign genes.

Characterization of a Salmonella typhimurium SL1344 cya mutant strain / 中国免疫学杂志

Objective:To explore the function of the cya gene and the preliminary mechanism of attenuated strain.Methods:The biological characteristics of cya mutant in acid and alkali resistant,salt resistance,motility,biofilm components,poisonous to the cells of epithelial cell adhesion,invasion were analysis.Results:The mobility capabilities,acid and alkali resistance and salt tolerance of cya mutant were significantly lower than the parent strain;the composition testing revealed that the cya mutant did not produce cellulose,curli and biofilm;at the same time the adhesion and invasion to epithelial cells of cya mutant had a prominent depression,and the toxicity to HeLa cells was weaker than the parent strain.Conclusion:The function of cya gene is closely related to athletic ability, penetration of cell membrane, the formation biofilm and virulence.It will provide a theory reference to the functional research of Salmonella typhimurium cya gene and the mechanism of attenuated strain.This will contribute to the development of oral vaccine using attenuated Salmonella typhimurium as vector.