Gnotobiotic piglets inoculated with Escherichia coli serotype O157:H7 strains that produced Shiga-like toxin II developed brain lesions similar to those observed in edema disease of swine, including arteriolar necrosis and malacia. Loss of ability to produce Shiga-like toxin II resulted in loss of ability to cause brain lesions.

Three monoclonal antibodies, designated MAb 16E6, MAb 13C4, and MAb 19G8, were produced which recognize Shiga-like toxin (SLT) from Escherichia coli. All three monoclonal antibodies neutralized the cytotoxicity of E. coli SLT and were able to immunoprecipitate intact labeled toxin with Staphylococcus aureus protein A. The three antibodies were of the G1 heavy and kappa light chain classes. MAb ...

Infections with shiga toxin-producing bacteria, like enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli and Shigella dysenteriae, represent a serious medical problem. No specific and effective treatment is available for patients with these infections, creating a need for the development of new therapies. Recombinant lactic acid bacterium Lactococcus lactis was engineered to bind Shiga toxin by displaying novel...

Associations between known or putative virulence factors of Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli and disease in humans were investigated. Univariate analysis and multivariate logistic regression analysis of a set of 237 isolates from 118 serotypes showed significant associations between the presence of genes for intimin (eae) and Shiga toxin 2 (stx2) and isolates from serotypes reported in hu...

Shiga toxin producing Escherichia coli O157:H7 (STEC) is one of the leading causes of food-poisoning around the world. Some STEC strains produce Shiga toxin 1 (Stx1) and/or Shiga toxin 2 (Stx2) or variants of either toxin, which are critical for the development of hemorrhagic colitis (HC) or hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS). Currently, there are no therapeutic treatments for HC or HUS. E. coli O...

Fecal samples (n = 531) submitted to a regional clinical laboratory during a 6-month period were tested for the presence of Shiga toxin using both a Vero cell cytotoxicity assay and the Shiga Toxin Quik Chek test (STQC), a rapid membrane immunoassay. Testing the samples directly (without culture), 9 positives were identified by the Vero cell assay, all of which were also detected by the STQC. T...

Cholera and Shiga toxin bind to the cell surface via glycolipid receptors GM1 and Gb3, respectively. Surprisingly, the majority of Vero cells from a non-synchronized population bind either Cholera or Shiga toxin but not both toxins. The hypothesis that the differential expression of toxin receptors is regulated by the cell cycle was tested. We find that Cholera toxin binds preferentially in G0/...

We have developed a rapid (1-h) real-time fluorescence-based PCR assay with the Smart Cycler thermal cycler (Cepheid, Sunnyvale, Calif.) for the detection of Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC), as well as other Shiga toxin-producing bacteria. Based on multiple-sequence alignments, we have designed two pairs of PCR primers that efficiently amplify all variants of the Shiga toxin genes...

IS1203v is an insertion sequence which has been found in inactivated Shiga toxin 2 genes of Escherichia coli O157:H7. We analyzed the transpositional mechanism of IS1203v in order to investigate whether the Shiga toxin 2 genes inactivated by IS1203v could revert to the wild type. When the transposase activity of IS1203v was enhanced by artificial frameshifting, IS1203v was obviously excised fro...

Enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli (EHEC) O26:H11, a serotype within Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC) that causes severe human disease, has been considered to have evolved from attaching and effacing E. coli (AEEC) O26:H11 through the acquisition of a Shiga toxin-encoding gene. Targeted amplicon sequencing using next-generation sequencing technology of 48 phylogenetically informative single...