Shared and distinct mechanisms of iron acquisition by bacterial and fungal pathogens of humans
Open Access
- 1 January 2013
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Frontiers Media SA in Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology
- Vol. 3, 80
- https://doi.org/10.3389/fcimb.2013.00080
Abstract
Iron is the most abundant transition metal in the human body and its bioavailability is stringently controlled. In particular, iron is tightly bound to host proteins such as transferrin to maintain homeostasis, to limit potential damage caused by iron toxicity under physiological conditions and to restrict access by pathogens. Therefore, iron acquisition during infection of a human host is a challenge that must be surmounted by every successful pathogenic microorganism. Iron is essential for bacterial and fungal physiological processes such as DNA replication, transcription, metabolism and energy generation via respiration. Hence, pathogenic bacteria and fungi have developed sophisticated strategies to gain access to iron from host sources. Indeed, siderophore production and transport, iron acquisition from heme and host iron-containing proteins such as hemoglobin and transferrin, and reduction of ferric to ferrous iron with subsequent transport are all strategies found in bacterial and fungal pathogens of humans. This review focuses on a comparison of these strategies between bacterial and fungal pathogens in the context of virulence and the iron limitation that occurs in the human body as a mechanism of innate nutritional defence.Keywords
This publication has 77 references indexed in Scilit:
- Characterization of a haemolytic factor from Candida albicansMicrobiology, 1999
- Microcytic anaemia mice have a mutation in Nramp2, a candidate iron transporter geneNature Genetics, 1997
- Haem iron‐transport system in enterohaemorrhagic Escherichia coli O157:H7Molecular Microbiology, 1997
- Transport of haemin across the cytoplasmic membrane through a haemin‐specific periplasmic binding‐protein‐dependent transport system in Yersinia enterocoliticaMolecular Microbiology, 1994
- Transport of ferric-aerobactin into the periplasm and cytoplasm of Escherichia coli K12: role of envelope-associated proteins and effect of endogenous siderophoresJournal of General Microbiology, 1992
- Transferrins and Heme-Compounds as Iron Sources for Pathogenic BacteriaCritical Reviews in Microbiology, 1992
- Nucleotide sequence and genetic organization of the ferric enterobactin transport system: homology to other peripiasmic binding protein‐dependent systems in Escherichia coliMolecular Microbiology, 1991
- Comparative study of the iron-binding properties of human transferrins: I. Complete and sequential iron saturation and desaturation of the lactotransferrinBiochimica et Biophysica Acta (BBA) - General Subjects, 1980
- Enterobactin, an iron transport compound from Salmonella typhimuriumBiochemical and Biophysical Research Communications, 1970
- An X-ray scattering study of ferritin and apoferritinJournal of Molecular Biology, 1965