Lipids of Clinically Significant Mycobacteria

Abstract

Dedication: To the memory of Philip Draper (1936-2019), a scientist of the highest integrity whose outstanding research in lipid chemistry and biochemistry was fundamental in the characterization of the leprosy bacillus and related mycobacteria.

Genetics in the Host‐Mycobacterium ulcerans interaction

“…In its reductive evolutionary path, M. ulcerans lost the functionality of cell wall and lipid biosynthetic proteins, which imposes limitations on the production of classes of sulfolipids or the glycosylation of phenolic lipids 10,14,30 . This ultimately resulted in a unique cell wall, composed of S ‐mycocerosates and erythro phenolphthiocerols, similar to the ones found in M marinum , but of opposite stereochemistry of the dimycocerosates found in other pathogenic mycobacteria 30‐34 (reviewed in 35 ). Immunization of mice with dewaxed whole‐cell M. ulcerans antigens, but not formalin‐fixed bacilli, caused an increase in M. ulcerans ‐specific IgG titers, suggesting that these lipidic structures concealed antigens from the host immune system 36 .…”

Editorial: Mycobacterial Glycolipids—Role in Immunomodulation and Targets for Vaccine Development

“…Glycolipids constitute a unique and important part of the mycobacterial cell envelope ( 9 ), and are some of the most potent mycobacterial immunomodulatory molecules ( 10 ). For instance, lipoarabinomannan (LAM) and its biosynthetic relatives, phosphatidylinositol mannosides (PIMs) and lipomannan (LM), exhibit important and unique immunomodulatory properties as agonists of several pattern recognition receptors (TLR2, DC-SIGN, Dectin-2) or as antigens of CD1-restricted T cells ( 11 , 12 ).…”

Development of lipid biomarker based diagnostic method for TB research in archaeological samples via HPLC-HRMS

“…In comparison with MTBC the distribution of α-MAs in general was much higher in NTM species, than the oxygenated keto-or methoxy-MAs. In our measurements the oxygenated MA-s of M. intracellulare, M. abscessus and M. chelonae showed different distribution to the published profiles (Minnikin & Brennan, 2020), which implies the need of further investigation. However, the published MA profiles of NTM species presents differences from our results (Song et al, 2009;Shui et al, 2011;Szewczyk et al, 2013;Minnikin & Brennan, 2020), with the low representation of oxygenated mycolates the differentiation of MTBC from NTM representatives seems possible with the application of lipid profiling via HPLC-MS.…”

“…Although the highest abundance belongs to the α-MAs in these cases, as well, the oxygenated MA-s are less or hardly even represented (Figure 28). In every cases α-MAs were more than 60% In contrast, the detailed review about mycobacterial lipids published by Minnikin and Brennan (2020) suggests that in the members of M. avium complex (e.g. M. intracellulare) methoxy-MAs are replaced by wax-ester MAs, moreover MAs of M. chelonae and M.…”

“…A MTBC törzsekkel összehasonlítva az alfa-mikolsavak magasabb részarányban jelentek meg a keto-és metoxi-mikolátokhoz képest az NTM fajokban. Habár a nem-tuberkulotikus Mycobacterium fajok mikolsav profiljait illetően az irodalmi adatoktól eltérő eredményt kaptunk a metoxi-és keto-mikolsavak esetében (Song et al, 2009;Shui et al, 2011;Szewczyk et al, 2013;Minnikin & Brennan, 2020), azok alacsony arányával a MTBC fajok megkülönböztetése az NTM fajoktól HPLC-MS módszerrel végzett lipid profilozással lehetségesnek tűnik.…”