|
KMID : 0613820180280050627
|
|
Journal of Life Science
2018 Volume.28 No. 5 p.627 ~ p.637
|
|
|
Motility and Chemotaxis in the Lyme Spirochete Borrelia burgdorferi:Role in Pathogenesis
|
|
Yoo Ah-Young
Kang Ho-Young
Moon Ki-Hwan
|
|
|
Abstract
|
|
|
|
Motility and chemotaxis are crucial for disease development in many motile pathogens, including spirochetes. In many bacteria, motility is provided by flagella rotation, which is controlled by a chemotaxis-signal-transduction system. Thus, motility and chemotaxis are inextricably linked. Spirochetes are a unique group of bacteria with distinctive flat-wave morphology and corkscrew-like locomotion. This unusual motility pattern is believed to be important for efficient motility within the dense tissues through which these spirochetes preferentially disseminate in a host. Unlike other externally flagellated bacteria-where flagella are in the ambient environment-the flagella of spirochetes are enclosed by the outer membrane and thus are called periplasmic flagella or endoflagella. Although motility- and chemotaxis-associated genes are well studied in some bacteria, the knowledge of how the spirochete achieves complex swimming and the roles of most of the putative spirochetal chemotaxis proteins are still elusive. Recently, cutting-edge imaging methods and unique genetic manipulations in spirochetes have helped to unravel the mystery of motility and chemotaxis in spirochetes. These contemporary advances in understanding the motility and chemotaxis of spirochetes in a host’s persistence and disease process are highlighted in this review.
|
|
|
KEYWORD
|
|
|
Borrelia burgdorferi, chemotaxis, lyme disease, motility, spirochete
|
|
|
FullTexts / Linksout information
|
|
|
|
|
|
Listed journal information
|
|
|