Evolutionary genetics: Ambiguous role of CCR5 in Y. pestis infection.

Abstract

Mecsas and colleagues suggest that a deficiency in the chemokine receptor CCR5 in humans is unlikely to confer protection against plague, based on their study of Yersinia pestis infection in Ccr5-deficient mice. They were testing the hypothesis that a mutation in the CCR5 gene, frequently found in Caucasians, may have been selected for in the past because it provided protection against (bubonic) plague; the mutation, called CCR5Delta32, is characterized by a 32-base-pair deletion. We have also tested this hypothesis by using Y. pestis infection in mice and, in addition, we have done phagocytosis experiments with macrophages from wild-type and Ccr5-deficient mice. Although, like Mecsas et al., we did not see any difference in the survival of the two groups of mice, we did find that there was a significantly reduced uptake of Y. pestis by Ccr5-deficient macrophages in vitro. Our results indicate that the role of Ccr5 in Y. pestis infection may therefore be more complex than previously thought.

• Authors: Stephen J Elvin, E Diane Williamson, Joanne C Scott, Jeremy N Smith, Guillermo Pérez De Lema, Silvia Chilla, Paul Clapham, Klaus Pfeffer, Detlef Schlöndorff, Bruno Luckow
• Journal: Nature (Nature) Vol. 430 Issue 6998 Pg. 417 (Jul 22 2004) ISSN: 1476-4687 [Electronic] England
• PMID: 15272490 (Publication Type: Journal Article, Comment)

Chemical References

• Receptors, CCR5

Topics

• Animals
• Evolution, Molecular
• Humans
• Macrophages (cytology, immunology, metabolism, microbiology)
• Mice
• Mice, Inbred BALB C
• Mice, Inbred C57BL
• Models, Biological
• Phagocytosis
• Plague (genetics, metabolism, microbiology)
• Receptors, CCR5 (deficiency, genetics, metabolism)
• Sequence Deletion (genetics)
• Survival Rate
• Virulence
• White People (genetics)
• Yersinia pestis (pathogenicity, physiology)