Construction of Brucella ClpS Gene Mutant Strain and Its Effect on Virulence

The present study aimed to determine the role of ClpS gene,and to analyse the impact of ClpS mutation on the virulence of Brucella.A ClpS gene mutant strain,named ΔClpS was constructed by homologous recombination technology.The bacterial growth kinetics,the LPS synthesis ability and the survival ability of bacterial within macrophages as well as the virulence in mouse model were measured.In addition,the difference between parent strain 2308 and the mutant strain ΔClpS were compared.The results showed that under the same culture conditions,no difference in bacterial concentration was observed between 2308 and ΔClpS strains.The silver staining examination showed that the expression level of LPS extracted from two strains were similar,indicating ClpS gene mutation did not alter the growth rate and LPS synthesis ability of Brucella. In the cell infection assay,the survival ability of ΔClpS strain in cells was extremely significantly lower than that of 2308 strain at 72 h after infection (P<0.01).The results of mouse infection experiment showed that in the first week after infection,no significant difference in spleen weight and bacterial concentration between 2308 and ΔClpS strains infected mice was observed.However,at 4 weeks after infection,the bacterial concentration in spleen of ΔClpS infected mice was 10^3.93 CFU/g spleen,which was significantly lower than that of 2308 strain (10^6.68 CFU/g spleen,P<0.01).The spleen weight of ΔClpS infected mice was also remarkably lower than that of 2308 strain (P<0.01).In summary,the results suggested that the ClpS gene of Brucella did not play a role in Brucella growth rate and ability of LPS synthesis,whereas ClpS gene mutation decreased the ability of Brucella colonization in mouse spleen.