Abstract
Salmonella typhimurium requires a type III secretion system encoded by pathogenicity island (SPI)-2 to survive and proliferate within macrophages. This survival implies that S. typhimurium avoids or withstands bactericidal events targeted to the microbe-containing vacuole, which include intraphagosomal production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), phagosomal acidification, and delivery of hydrolytic enzymes to the phagosome via fusion with lysosomes. Recent evidence suggests that S. typhimurium alters ROS production by murine macrophages in an SPI-2-dependent manner. To gain insights into the mechanism by which S. typhimurium inhibits intraphagosomal ROS production, we analyzed the subcellular distribution of NADPH oxidase components during infection of human monocyte-derived macrophages by wild-type (WT) or several SPI-2 mutant strains of S. typhimurium. We found that the membrane component of the NADPH oxidase, flavocytochrome b(558), was actively excluded or rapidly removed from the phagosomal membrane of WT-infected monocyte-derived macrophages, thereby preventing assembly of the NADPH oxidase complex and intraphagosomal production of superoxide anion. In contrast, the NADPH oxidase assembled on and generated ROS in phagosomes containing SPI-2 mutant S. typhimurium. Subversion of NADPH oxidase assembly by S. typhimurium was accompanied by increased bacterial replication relative to that of SPI-2 mutant strains, suggesting that the ability of WT S. typhimurium to prevent NADPH oxidase assembly at the phagosomal membrane represents an important virulence factor influencing its intracellular survival.