ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2006
A pneumococcal pilus influences virulence and host inflammatory responses.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2006. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 229 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
229 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 473 citations in OpenAlex.
- The association between bacteria colonizing the upper respiratory tract and lower respiratory tract infection in young children: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Clinical microbiology and infection : the official publication of the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases · 2021Pooled it
- Role of pilus proteins in adherence and invasion of Streptococcus agalactiae to the lung and cervical epithelial cells.The Journal of biological chemistry · 2013Trial
- Clinical and Epidemiological Landscape of Antimicrobial Resistance and Virulence inAntibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Genomic surveillance of post-immunization pneumococcal carriage in Ghana.Microbial genomics · 2026Article
- Influenza A Virus Coinfection AltersbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Genomic and phenotypic characterization of a multidrug-resistant Streptococcus pneumoniae 19 F ST320 isolate from a pediatric SARS-CoV-2 case in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Class C sortases of the SrtBCD pilus cluster involved in the virulence of Streptococcus suis in the mouse model.Folia microbiologica · 2026Article
- Structural and Functional Characterization of Protein Adhesins and Pili in Mycobacterium tuberculosis.Advances in experimental medicine and biology · 2026Article
- Article
- Stem cell-derived brain-like endothelial cells to interrogateVirulence · 2025Article
- Article
- Streptococcus pneumoniae epidemiology, pathogenesis and control.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2025Review
- The Exoproteome and Surfaceome of ToxigenicJournal of proteome research · 2025Article
- Glycan-mediated adhesion mechanisms in antibiotic-resistant bacteria.BBA advances · 2025Article
- Serological Profiling of Pneumococcal Proteins Reveals Unique Patterns of Acquisition, Maintenance, and Waning of Antibodies Throughout Life.The Journal of infectious diseases · 2024Article
- Essential role of proline synthesis and the one-carbon metabolism pathways for systemic virulence ofmBio · 2024Article
- Bacteriological characteristics and changes ofEpidemiology and infection · 2024Article
- Biological puzzles solved by usingJournal of bacteriology · 2024Review
- Genomic and panproteomic analysis of the development of infant immune responses to antigenically-diverse pneumococci.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Structural and functional insights of sortases and their interactions with antivirulence compounds.Current research in structural biology · 2024Review
169 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
20 authors at 4 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Streptococcus pneumoniae (pneumococcus) is a major cause of morbidity and mortality world-wide. The initial event in invasive pneumococcal disease is the attachment of encapsulated pneumococci to epithelial cells in the upper respiratory tract. This work provides evidence that initial bacterial adhesion and subsequent ability to cause invasive disease is enhanced by pili, long organelles able to extend beyond the polysaccharide capsule, previously unknown to exist in pneumococci. These adhesive pili-like appendages are encoded by the pneumococcal rlrA islet, present in some, but not all, clinical isolates. Introduction of the rlrA islet into an encapsulated rlrA-negative isolate allowed pilus expression, enhanced adherence to lung epithelial cells, and provided a competitive advantage upon mixed intranasal challenge of mice. Furthermore, a pilus-expressing rlrA islet-positive clinical isolate was more virulent than a nonpiliated deletion mutant, and it out-competed the mutant in murine models of colonization, pneumonia, and bacteremia. Additionally, piliated pneumococci evoked a higher TNF response during systemic infection, compared with nonpiliated derivatives, suggesting that pneumococcal pili not only contribute to adherence and virulence but also stimulate the host inflammatory response.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.