Staphylococcus aureus is a major human pathogen that produces a wide array of toxins, thus causing various types of disease symptoms. Staphylococcal enterotoxins (SEs), a family of nine major serological types of heat stable enterotoxins, are a leading cause of gastroenteritis resulting from consumption of contaminated food. In addition, SEs are powerful superantigens that stimulate non-specific T-cell proliferation. SEs share close phylogenetic relationships, with similar structures and activities. Here we review the structure and function of each known enterotoxin.

Staphylococci are a major health threat because of increasing resistance to antibiotics. An alternative to antibiotic treatment is preventing virulence by inhibition of bacterial cell-to-cell communication using the quorum-sensing inhibitor RNAIII-inhibiting peptide (RIP). In this work, we identified 2Ј,5-di-O-galloyl-Dhamamelose (hamamelitannin) as a nonpeptide analog of RIP by virtual screening of a RIP-based pharmacophore against a database of commercially available small-molecule compounds. Hamamelitannin is a natural product found in the bark of Hamamelis virginiana (witch hazel), and it has no effect on staphylococcal growth in vitro; but like RIP, it does inhibit the quorum-sensing regulator RNAIII. In a rat graft model, hamamelitannin prevented device-associated infections in vivo, including infections caused by methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus and Staphylococcus epidermidis strains. These findings suggest that hamamelitannin may be used as a suppressor to staphylococcal infections.

Staphylococcus aureus causes pathologies ranging from minor skin infections to life-threatening diseases. Pathogenic effects are largely due to production of bacterial toxin, which is regulated by an RNA molecule, RNAIII. The S. aureus protein called RAP (RNAIII activating protein) activates RNAIII, and a peptide called RIP (RNAIII inhibiting peptide), produced by a nonpathogenic bacteria, inhibits RNAIII. Mice vaccinated with RAP or treated with purified or synthetic RIP were protected from S. aureus pathology. Thus, these two molecules may provide useful approaches for the prevention and treatment of diseases caused by S. aureus.

Staphylococcus aureus can cause disease through the production of toxins. Toxin production is autoinduced by the protein RNAIII-activating protein (RAP) and by the autoinducing peptide (AIP), and is inhibited by RNAIII-inhibiting peptide (RIP) and by inhibitory AIPs. RAP has been shown to be a useful vaccine target site, and RIP and inhibitory AIPs as therapeutic molecules to prevent and suppress S. aureus infections. Development of therapeutic strategies based on these molecules has been hindered by a lack of knowledge of the molecular mechanisms by which they activate or inhibit virulence. Here, we show that RAP specifically induces the phosphorylation of a novel 21-kDa protein, whereas RIP inhibits its phosphorylation. This protein was termed target of RAP (TRAP). The synthesis of the virulence regulatory molecule, RNAIII, is not activated by RAP in the trap mutant strain, suggesting that RAP activates RNAIII synthesis via TRAP. Phosphoamino acid analysis shows that TRAP is histidine-phosphorylated, suggesting that TRAP may be a sensor of RAP. AIPs upregulate the synthesis of RNAIII also in trap mutant strains, suggesting that TRAP and AIPs activate RNAIII synthesis via distinct signal transduction pathways. Furthermore, TRAP phosphorylation is down-regulated in the presence of AIP, suggesting that a network of signal transduction pathways regulate S. aureus pathogenesis.

Inflammation of the respiratory tract is associated with the production of reactive oxygen species, such as hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and superoxide (O2-), which contribute extensively to lung injury in diseases of the respiratory tract. The mechanisms and target molecules of these oxidants are mainly unknown but may involve modifications of growth-factor receptors. We have shown that H2O2 induces epidermal growth factor (EGF)-receptor tyrosine phosphorylation in intact cells as well as in membranes of A549 lung epithelial cells. On the whole, total phosphorylation of the EGF receptor induced by H2O2 was lower than that induced by the ligand EGF. Phosphorylation was confined to tyrosine residues and was inhibited by addition of genistein, indicating that it was due to the activation of protein tyrosine kinase (PTK). Phosphoamino acid analysis revealed that although the ligand, EGF, enhanced the phosphorylation of serine, threonine, and tyrosine residues, H2O2 preferentially enhanced tyrosine phosphorylation of the EGF receptor. Serine and threonine phosphorylation did not occur, and the turnover rate of the EGF receptor was slower after H2O2 exposure. Selective H2O2-mediated phosphorylation of tyrosine residues on the EGF receptor was sufficient to activate phosphorylation of an SH2-group-bearing substrate, phospholipase C-gamma (PLC-gamma), but did not increase mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinase activity. Moreover, H2O2 exposure decreased protein kinase C (PKC)-alpha activity by causing translocation of PKC-alpha from the membrane to the cytoplasm. These studies provide novel insights into the capacity of a reactive oxidant, such as H2O2, to modulate EGF-receptor function and its downstream signaling. The H2O2-induced increase in tyrosine phosphorylation of the EGF receptor, and the receptor's slower rate of turnover and altered downstream phosphorylation signals may represent a mechanism by which EGF-receptor signaling can be modulated during inflammatory processes, thereby affecting cell proliferation and thus having implications in wound repair or tumor formation.

The quorum-sensing inhibitor RIP inhibits staphylococcal TRAP/agr systems and both TRAP-and agrnegative strains are deficient in biofilm formation in vivo, indicating the importance of quorum sensing to biofilms in the host. RIP injected systemically into rats has been found to have strong activity in preventing methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus graft infections, suggesting that RIP can be used as a therapeutic agent.Millions of indwelling medical devices are implanted annually and are at risk of persistent infections caused by bacteria organized as a biofilm. Such biofilms are resistant to antibiotics, are difficult to treat, and are common causes of morbidity and mortality (1,14,17,26,29,13,34,35). Staphylococcus aureus and S. epidermidis are common causes of device-associated infections. S. aureus (like Pseudomonas aeruginosa) regulates virulence through two quorum-sensing (QS) systems that regulate one another (4,23,33,28,41). One QS uses the 33-kDa autoinducer RNAIII-activating protein (RAP), which induces the phosphorylation of the target of RAP (TRAP) (4,5,8,22,23,24). The other QS uses the autoinducing peptide AIP, which phosphorylates AgrC, resulting in the production of RNAIII and toxins (10,18,25,27,30,31,32,37,38).TRAP is a 21-kDa protein that was shown to regulate the expression of the many toxins and their regulator, agr (9, 23). In the absence of TRAP expression or phosphorylation, the bacteria do not produce toxins and do not cause disease (as determined from tests with multiple strains and species of S. aureus and S. epidermidis) (9,22,39,40). To directly test the biofilm formation by TRAP and agr mutants in vivo, TRAP-and agr-negative mutants and their parent strains were injected onto a graft (n ϭ 10) by using the rat graft model. The bacteria used were S. aureus 8325-4, a wild-type (WT) laboratory strain, and its isogenic derivative with an inactivated TRAP gene (the TRAP-negative strain) (22) and WT laboratory strain S. aureus RN6390 and its agrnegative isogenic derivative, strain RN6911 (30, 31). The results (Fig. 1) show that the TRAP-negative mutants formed very little biofilm (27 Ϯ 5 CFU/ml) compared to the amount formed by control parent strain S. aureus 8325-4 (5.0 ϫ 10 5 Ϯ 1

Staphylococcus aureus is a major human pathogen causing diseases which range from minor skin infection to endocarditis and toxic shock syndrome. The pathogenesis ofS. aureus is due primarily to the production of toxic exoproteins, whose synthesis is controlled by a global regulatory system, agr. We show here that agr is autoinduced by a proteinaceous factor produced and secreted by the bacteria and that it is inhibited by a peptide produced by an exoproteindeficient S. aureus mutant strain. The inhibitor, RIP, competes with the activator, RAP, and may be a mutational derivative. Our results suggest two possible approaches, independent of antibiotics, to the control of S. aureus infections. RIP may prove useful as a direct inhibitor of virulence and RAP as a vaccine against the expression of agr-induced virulence factors; either could interfere with the ability of the bacteria to establish and maintain an infection.

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