TY  - JOUR
TI  - Quantification of Neisseria meningitidis Adherence to Human  Epithelial Cells by Colony Counting
AU  - Sigurlásdóttir, Sara 
AU  - Saroj, Sunil D
AU  - Eriksson, Olaspers Sara
AU  - Eriksson, Jens 
AU  - Jonsson, Ann-Beth  
VL  - 8
IS  - 3
PY  - 2018
DA  - 2018/02/05
SP  - e2709
C1  - Bio-protocol 2018;8:e2709
DO  - 10.21769/BioProtoc.2709
UR  - https://doi.org/10.21769/BioProtoc.2709
AB  - To cause an infection, the human specific pathogen Neisseria meningitides must first colonize the nasopharynx. Upon tight interaction with the mucosal epithelium, N. meningitidis may cross the epithelial cellular barrier, reach the bloodstream and cause sepsis and/or meningitis. Since N. meningitidis niche is restricted to humans the availability of relevant animal models to study host-pathogen interactions are limiting. Therefore, most findings that involve N. meningitidis colonization derive from studies using cultured human cell lines. Human epithelial cells have been successfully used to examine and identify molecular effectors involved in initial adherence of the pathogen. Here, we describe a standard protocol to quantify the adherence of N. meningitidis to epithelial pharyngeal FaDu cells. Colony counts of cell lysates collected after infection are used to quantify adherence to the epithelial cells.
KW  - Neisseria
KW  - Colonization
KW  - Adherence
KW  - Adhesion assay
KW  - Type IV pili
JF  - Bio-protocol
SN  - 2331-8325
PB  - Bio-protocol LLC.
BIO101  - False