Arachidonic Acid Stress Impacts Pneumococcal Fatty Acid Homeostasis.

ABSTRACT: Free fatty acids hold dual roles during infection, serving to modulate the host immune response while also functioning directly as antimicrobials. Of particular importance are the long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids, which are not commonly found in bacterial organisms, that have been proposed to have antibacterial roles. Arachidonic acid (AA) is a highly abundant long chain polyunsaturated fatty acid and we examined its effect upon Streptococcus pneumoniae. Here, we observed that in a murine model of S. pneumoniae infection the concentration of AA significantly increases in the blood. The impact of AA stress upon the pathogen was then assessed by a combination of biochemical, biophysical and microbiological assays. In vitro bacterial growth and intra-macrophage surv

SUBMITTER: Eijkelkamp BA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5958418 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature