AUTHOR=Chen Po-Lin , Chen Yi-Wei , Ou Chun-Chun , Lee Tzer-Min , Wu Chi-Jung , Ko Wen-Chien , Chen Chang-Shi 

TITLE=A Disease Model of Muscle Necrosis Caused by Aeromonas dhakensis Infection in Caenorhabditis elegans

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=7

YEAR=2017

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2016.02058

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2016.02058

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=<p>A variety of bacterial infections cause muscle necrosis in humans. <italic>Caenorhabditis elegans</italic> has epidermis and bands of muscle that resemble soft-tissue structures in mammals and humans. Here, we developed a muscle necrosis model caused by <italic>Aeromonas dhakensis</italic> infection in <italic>C. elegans</italic>. Our data showed that <italic>A. dhakensis</italic> infected and killed <italic>C. elegans</italic> rapidly. Characteristic muscle damage in <italic>C. elegans</italic> induced by <italic>A. dhakensis</italic> was demonstrated <italic>in vivo</italic>. Relative expression levels of host necrosis-associated genes, <italic>asp-3</italic>, <italic>asp-4</italic>, and <italic>crt-1</italic> increased significantly after <italic>A. dhakensis</italic> infection. The RNAi sensitive NL2099 <italic>rrf-3 (pk1426</italic>) worms with knockdown of necrosis genes of <italic>crt-1</italic> and <italic>asp-4</italic> by RNAi showed prolonged survival after <italic>A. dhakensis</italic> infection. Specifically knockdown of <italic>crt-1</italic> and <italic>asp-4</italic> by RNAi in WM118 worms, which restricted RNAi only to the muscle cells, conferred significant resistance to <italic>A. dhakensis</italic> infection. In contrast, the severity of muscle damage and toxicity produced by the <italic>A. dhakensis</italic> hemolysin-deletion mutant is attenuated. In another example, shiga-like toxin-producing enterohemorrhagic <italic>E. coli</italic> (EHEC) known to elicit toxicity to <italic>C. elegans</italic> with concomitant enteropathogenicty, did not cause muscle necrosis as <italic>A. dhakensis</italic> did. Taken together, these results show that <italic>Aeromonas</italic> infection induces muscle necrosis and rapid death of infected <italic>C. elegans</italic>, which are similar to muscle necrosis in humans, and then validate the value of the <italic>C. elegans</italic> model with <italic>A. dhakensis</italic> infection in studying <italic>Aeromonas</italic> pathogenicity.</p>