Figure 4.
Clearance kinetics of smooth and rough Brucella from the murine peritoneal cavity and in vitro susceptibility to complement. Mice were infected with 108 cfu of either smooth B. melitensis 16M or rough B. melitensis 16MΔmanBA. Bacterial recovery from the ascites over a 7-day period revealed a lower percentage of smooth organisms (A) than rough organisms (B) internalized. Systemic infection was determined by recovery of smooth and rough organisms from secondary lymphoid organs, spleen (C), and liver (D). Significant differences (p ≤ 0.05) are represented with asterisks (*). (E) Shows the differences in susceptibility/resistance to complement-mediated lysis of smooth (B. melitensis 16M) and rough organisms (B. melitensis 16M R1, B. abortus RB51, and E. coli JM101) using sera from several host species. ΔLogcfu represents the difference in recovered colony forming units (cfu) following incubation in the presence or absence of naïve sera. Resistant organisms will exhibit very little difference in survival (values close to zero) while sensitive organisms will exhibit a difference in recovery. The inoculum reveals the cfu per milliliter used in these experiments. The error bars reveal SD of across five mice.