Global Transcriptional Responses of Murine Macrophages to Anthrax Lethal Toxin

Abstract

Anthrax is an infectious disease caused by Bacillus anthracis. The spores of B. anthracis are accessed into the body and germinated in macrophages. B. anthracis secretes three virulence factors (such as, protective antigen; PA, lethal factor : LF, and edema factor : EF), and escapes destruction and lyse the macrophages by an unknown mechanism. Anthrax toxins play a central role in pathogenesis of anthrax. Lethal toxin (LeTx) is a mixture of PA and LF. A direct causal relationships between cleavage of the MAPKKs and are not established. Intoxication of murine macrophages (RAW 264.7) with the LeTx results in profound alterations in the host cell gene expression. The role of LeTx in mediating these effects is unknown, largely due to the difficulty in identifying and assigning function to individual genes and proteins.