Emerging Themes in Anthrax

A special issue of Life (ISSN 2075-1729). This special issue belongs to the section "Microbiology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 December 2024 | Viewed by 7133

Special Issue Editors

Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale della Puglia e della Basilicata, 71121 Foggia, Italy
Interests: veterinary bacteriology; Bacillus anthracis; anthrax; molecular diagnostics; molecular typing; vaccines; immunology
Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale della Puglia e della Basilicata, 71121 Foggia, Italy
Interests: veterinary bacteriology; Bacillus anthracis; anthrax; molecular diagnostics; molecular typing; vaccines; immunology; mass spectrometry MALDI-TOF
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Anthrax is an important infectious disease, mainly affecting ruminants (domestic and wild animals) and can be transmitted to humans exposed to infected animals or infected products of animal origin. The etiological agent of anthrax is Bacillus anthracis, a Gram-positive rod-shaped bacterium that is capable of producing extremely resistant spores that, under unfavorable environmental conditions, can survive in the environment for several decades. In receptive animals (in particular, cattle, buffalo, sheep, goats, deer, and other wild ungulates), anthrax develops without apparent symptoms but has a fatal outcome, characterized by sudden death due to acute or hyperacute septicemia and leakage of uncoagulated blood from natural openings.

In humans, anthrax can occur in three different forms with clinical signs dependent on the penetration route of the pathogen: cutaneous, pulmonary, and gastrointestinal. Moreover, another fatal form has been described in drug users occurring after the intravenous injection of drugs contaminated with anthrax spores. B. anthracis lives most of its existence in the form of spores in soils, until ideal conditions develop, allowing it to enter the reproductive cycle, which is presented mainly in domestic and wild ruminants. Furthermore, B. anthracis is considered one of the most important agents of bioterrorism. Because of its characteristics, it can be potentially misused as a biological weapon.

New molecular and genomic tools can help to improve our understanding of the disease’s epidemiology and the pathogen’s biology.

In this Special Issue, we aim to both summarize current knowledge and explore emerging themes and developments in our understanding of the pathogen and of the disease. We, thus, invite the submission of research and review articles that cover any aspect of the bacteriology, epidemiology, molecular biology, genomics, immunology, pathogenesis, vaccine development, new decontaminants or diagnostics of anthrax. We look forward to your contributions.

Dr. Antonio Fasanella
Dr. Domenico Galante
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • Bacillus anthracis
  • anthrax
  • epidemiology
  • genomics
  • pathogenesis
  • immunology
  • vaccines
  • treatment
  • decontaminants

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

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12 pages, 993 KiB  
Article
Identification of Universally Applicable and Species-Specific Marker Peptides for Bacillus anthracis
by Natalie Witt, Domenico Galante, Sandro Andreotti, Mostafa Abdel Glil, Antonio Fasanella, David Meierhofer and Herbert Tomaso
Life 2022, 12(10), 1549; https://doi.org/10.3390/life12101549 - 06 Oct 2022
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Abstract
Anthrax is a zoonotic infection caused by the bacterium Bacillus anthracis (BA). Specific identification of this pathogen often relies on targeting genes located on two extrachromosomal plasmids, which represent the major pathogenicity factors of BA. However, more recent findings show that these plasmids [...] Read more.
Anthrax is a zoonotic infection caused by the bacterium Bacillus anthracis (BA). Specific identification of this pathogen often relies on targeting genes located on two extrachromosomal plasmids, which represent the major pathogenicity factors of BA. However, more recent findings show that these plasmids have also been found in other closely related Bacillus species. In this study, we investigated the possibility of identifying species-specific and universally applicable marker peptides for BA. For this purpose, we applied a high-resolution mass spectrometry-based approach for 42 BA isolates. Along with the genomic sequencing data and by developing a bioinformatics data evaluation pipeline, which uses a database containing most of the publicly available protein sequences worldwide (UniParc), we were able to identify eleven universal marker peptides unique to BA. These markers are located on the chromosome and therefore, might overcome known problems, such as observable loss of plasmids in environmental species, plasmid loss during cultivation in the lab, and the fact that the virulence plasmids are not necessarily a unique feature of BA. The identified chromosomally encoded markers in this study could extend the small panel of already existing chromosomal targets and along with targets for the virulence plasmids, may pave the way to an even more reliable identification of BA using genomics- as well as proteomics-based techniques. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Emerging Themes in Anthrax)
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14 pages, 1522 KiB  
Article
Using a Syrian (Golden) Hamster Biological Model for the Evaluation of Recombinant Anthrax Vaccines
by Tatiana Kravchenko, Galina Titareva, Irina Bakhteeva, Tatiana Kombarova, Alexander Borzilov, Raisa Mironova, Kseniya Khlopova and Vitalii Timofeev
Life 2021, 11(12), 1388; https://doi.org/10.3390/life11121388 - 11 Dec 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1780
Abstract
In this paper, we demonstrate that a Syrian hamster biological model can be applied to the study of recombinant anthrax vaccines. We show that double vaccination with recombinant proteins, such as protective antigen (PA) and fusion protein LF1PA4, consisting of lethal factor I [...] Read more.
In this paper, we demonstrate that a Syrian hamster biological model can be applied to the study of recombinant anthrax vaccines. We show that double vaccination with recombinant proteins, such as protective antigen (PA) and fusion protein LF1PA4, consisting of lethal factor I domain (LF) and PA domain IV, leads to the production of high titers of specific antibodies and to protection from infection with the toxicogenic encapsulated attenuated strain B. anthracis 71/12. In terms of antibody production and protection, Syrian hamsters were much more comparable to guinea pigs than mice. We believe that Syrian hamsters are still underestimated as a biological model for anthrax research, and, in some cases, they can be used as a replacement or at least as a complement to the traditionally used mouse model. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Emerging Themes in Anthrax)
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Review

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16 pages, 751 KiB  
Review
Some Peculiarities of Anthrax Epidemiology in Herbivorous and Carnivorous Animals
by Irina Bakhteeva and Vitalii Timofeev
Life 2022, 12(6), 870; https://doi.org/10.3390/life12060870 - 10 Jun 2022
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2282
Abstract
Anthrax is an especially dangerous zooanthroponosis caused by the Gram-positive spore-forming bacterium Bacillus anthracis. A notable feature of this disease is the difference in susceptibility to it among different groups of animals. Anthrax primarily affects herbivorous ungulate mammals; they are easily infected, [...] Read more.
Anthrax is an especially dangerous zooanthroponosis caused by the Gram-positive spore-forming bacterium Bacillus anthracis. A notable feature of this disease is the difference in susceptibility to it among different groups of animals. Anthrax primarily affects herbivorous ungulate mammals; they are easily infected, and their disease often leads to rapid, even sudden, death. However, predators and scavengers are extremely resistant to anthrax, and if they become infected, they usually become mildly ill. As the result of the increased sensitivity of ungulates to anthrax and the possibility of disease transmission from them to humans, most studies of anthrax have focused on the diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of infection in farm animals and humans. The issues of anthrax in other animals, such as predators, and the peculiarities of anthrax epidemiology in wild ungulates have not been sufficiently detailed in the literature. In this article, we provide a review of literature sources that describe the differential susceptibility to infection of various groups of animals to anthrax and some epidemiological features of anthrax in animals that are not the main hosts of B. anthracis. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Emerging Themes in Anthrax)
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