ArticlePLoS pathogens2017
A virulence-associated filamentous bacteriophage of Neisseria meningitidis increases host-cell colonisation.
Article in PLoS pathogens, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 54 papers.
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Who cites it
54 citing papers in PubMed, 80 citations in OpenAlex.
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- Temperate and filamentous bacteriophages as reservoirs of bacterial virulence in stony coral tissue loss disease.Coral reefs (Online) · 2026Article
- Neisseria meningitidis filamentous phage MDA promotes colonisation by selecting hyperadhesive pili variants.Nature communications · 2025Article
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- Impact of host factors and invasive meningococci on bacterial adhesion, proliferation, primary nasal epithelial barrier function, and immune response.Microbiology spectrum · 2025Article
- Targeted disruption of phage liquid crystalline droplets abolishes antibiotic tolerance of bacterial biofilms.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Filamentous prophages in the genomes of Acinetobacter baumannii from egypt: impact on biofilm formation and the potential to induce enterotoxicity.BMC microbiology · 2025Article
- Phage-Microbiota Crosstalk: Implications for Central Nervous System Disorders.International journal of molecular sciences · 2025Review
- Structure of the virulence-associatedProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Filamentous bacteriophage M13 induces proinflammatory responses in intestinal epithelial cells.Infection and immunity · 2025Article
- The role of filamentous matrix molecules in shaping the architecture and emergent properties of bacterial biofilms.The Biochemical journal · 2024Review
- Microevolution and Its Impact on Hypervirulence, Antimicrobial Resistance, and Vaccine Escape inMicroorganisms · 2023Review
- Genetic variants linked to the phenotypic outcome of invasive disease and carriage ofMicrobial genomics · 2023Article
- Comparison of gut viral communities in children under 5 years old and newborns.Virology journal · 2023Article
- Viruses Regulate Microbial Community Assembly Together with Environmental Factors in Acid Mine Drainage.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2023Article
- Tripartite interactions between filamentous Pf4 bacteriophage, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and bacterivorous nematodes.PLoS pathogens · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
9 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Neisseria meningitidis is a commensal of human nasopharynx. In some circumstances, this bacteria can invade the bloodstream and, after crossing the blood brain barrier, the meninges. A filamentous phage, designated MDAΦ for Meningococcal Disease Associated, has been associated with invasive disease. In this work we show that the prophage is not associated with a higher virulence during the bloodstream phase of the disease. However, looking at the interaction of N. meningitidis with epithelial cells, a step essential for colonization of the nasopharynx, we demonstrate that the presence of the prophage, via the production of viruses, increases colonization of encapsulated meningococci onto monolayers of epithelial cells. The analysis of the biomass covering the epithelial cells revealed that meningococci are bound to the apical surface of host cells by few layers of heavily piliated bacteria, whereas, in the upper layers, bacteria are non-piliated but surrounded by phage particles which (i) form bundles of filaments, and/or (ii) are in some places associated with bacteria. The latter are likely to correspond to growing bacteriophages during their extrusion through the outer membrane. These data suggest that, as the biomass increases, the loss of piliation in the upper layers of the biomass does not allow type IV pilus bacterial aggregation, but is compensated by a large production of phage particles that promote bacterial aggregation via the formation of bundles of phage filaments linked to the bacterial cell walls. We propose that MDAΦ by increasing bacterial colonization in the mucosa at the site-of-entry, increase the occurrence of diseases.
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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.