Fig. 4.
Attenuation of A. baumannii ATCC 17,978 mutants (a) and 29D2 mutants (b) in the Galleria mellonella caterpillar infection model. G. mellonella caterpillars were infected with 3 × 105 CFU of A. baumannii strains as indicated. Sterile PBS (black lines) was used as a control. Three independent experiments were performed with groups of 16 caterpillars for every bacterial strain and control. Data obtained from three independent experiments were averaged and represented by the mean ± SD. In strain ATCC 17978, 15 out of 30 mutants show a significant attenuation 5 days p.i. (P values see Table 1) compared to the wildtype strain (a). In strain 29D2 11 out of 21 mutants are attenuated (P values indicated in Table 2) in the Galleria mellonella infection model (b). See Supplementary Figs. S6 and S7 for infection data of all strains described in this study