Pathways of host cell exit by intracellular pathogens
Authors:Antje Flieger1,#, Freddy Frischknecht2, Georg Häcker3, Mathias W. Hornef4, Gabriele Pradel5
1 Division of Enteropathogenic Bacteria and Legionella, Robert Koch Institute, Wernigerode, Germany.
2 Center for Infectious Diseases, University of Heidelberg, Germany.
3 Institute of Medical Microbiology and Hygiene, Medical Center – University of Freiburg, Germany.
4 Institute of Medical Microbiology, RWTH Aachen University Hospital, Germany.
5 Division of Cellular and Applied Infection Biology, Institute of Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, Germany.
# Authors listed in alphabetic order.
Keywords:
host cell, egress, exit, pathogen, vacuolar escape, compartment, programmed cell death, membrane lysis
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Conflict of interest statement:
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Please cite this article as:
Antje Flieger, Freddy Frischknecht, Georg Häcker, Mathias W. Hornef, Gabriele Pradel (2018). Pathways of host cell exit by intracellular pathogens. Microbial Cell 5(12): 525-544. doi: 10.15698/mic2018.12.659
© 2018 Flieger et al. This is an open-access article released under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, which allows the unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are acknowledged.
Abstract:
Host cell exit is a critical step in the life-cycle of intracellular pathogens, intimately linked to barrier penetration, tissue dissemination, inflammation, and pathogen transmission. Like cell invasion and intracellular survival, host cell exit represents a well-regulated program that has evolved during host-pathogen co-evolution and that relies on the dynamic and intricate interplay between multiple host and microbial factors. Three distinct pathways of host cell exit have been identified that are employed by three different taxa of intracellular pathogens, bacteria, fungi and protozoa, namely (i) the initiation of programmed cell death, (ii) the active breaching of host cell-derived membranes, and (iii) the induced membrane-dependent exit without host cell lysis. Strikingly, an increasing number of studies show that the majority of intracellular pathogens utilize more than one of these strategies, dependent on life-cycle stage, environmental factors and/or host cell type. This review summarizes the diverse exit strategies of intracellular-living bacterial, fungal and protozoan pathogens and discusses the convergently evolved commonalities as well as system-specific variations thereof. Key microbial molecules involved in host cell exit are highlighted and discussed as potential targets for future interventional approaches.
doi: 10.15698/mic2018.12.659
Volume 5, pp. 525 to 544, published 18/10/2018.