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. 1995 Dec;177(23):6989–6992. doi: 10.1128/jb.177.23.6989-6992.1995

Influence of Pseudomonas aeruginosa exoproducts on virulence factor production in Burkholderia cepacia: evidence of interspecies communication.

D McKenney 1, K E Brown 1, D G Allison 1
PMCID: PMC177571  PMID: 7592496

Abstract

The effect of concentrated cell-free extracellular material from stationary-phase cultures of Burkholderia cepacia 10661 and Pseudomonas aeruginosa PAO1 on virulence factor production in B. cepacia was assessed. While increasing concentrations of the B. cepacia exoproduct caused a slight increase in siderophore, lipase, and protease production in the producing organism, a significant in productivity was observed for all three virulence factors with the addition of the PAO1 exoproduct. Moreover, the addition of the exoproduct from a strain of P. aeruginosa producing reduced amounts of autoinducer caused only a slightly greater response than that of the control. Both B. cepacia 10661 and P. aeruginosa PAO1, along with two matched clinical isolates of both organisms obtained from a cystic fibrotic patient, were shown to produce variable amounts of three different types of autoinducer. The potential for interspecies signalling in microbial pathogenicity is discussed.

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Selected References

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