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Stalemate

Nature Reviews Microbiology volume 7, pages 178–179 (2009)Cite this article

Granulomas are characteristic of tuberculosis, and consist of aggregates of immune cells, notably macrophages and lymphocytes. Because of their structure, it has been assumed that tuberculous granulomas physically prevent the bacteria from spreading throughout the body. But recent work with zebrafish has suggested that the bacterium might in fact make use of granulomas, at least early in infection.

Davis and Ramakrishnan investigated this idea, taking advantage of the transparency of zebrafish embryos to develop real-time techniques to study granuloma formation. They also studied the effects of the mycobacterial RD1 locus, which encodes a protein secretion system.

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References

ORIGINAL RESEARCH PAPER

  1. Davis, J. J. & Ramakrishnan, L. The role of the granuloma in expansion and dissemination of early tuberculous infection. Cell 136, 37–49 (2009)

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FURTHER READING

  1. Volkman, S. E. et al. Tuberculous granuloma formation is enhanced by a Mycobacterium virulence determinant. PLoS Biol. 2, e367 (2004)

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Authors
  1. Amanda Tromans
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Tromans, A. Stalemate. Nat Rev Microbiol 7, 178–179 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrmicro2094

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrmicro2094

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