Intestinal infection regulates behavior and learning via neuroendocrine signaling

  1. Jogender Singh
  2. Alejandro Aballay  Is a corresponding author
  1. Oregon Health and Science University, United States

Abstract

The recognition of pathogens and subsequent activation of defense responses are critical for the survival of organisms. The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans recognizes pathogenic bacteria and elicits defense responses by activating immune pathways and pathogen avoidance. Here we show that chemosensation of phenazines produced by pathogenic Pseudomonas aeruginosa, which leads to rapid activation of DAF-7/TGF-β in ASJ neurons, is insufficient for the elicitation of pathogen avoidance behavior. Instead, intestinal infection and bloating of the lumen, which depend on the virulence of P. aeruginosa, regulates both pathogen avoidance and aversive learning by modulating not only the DAF-7/TGF-β pathway but also the G-protein coupled receptor NPR-1 pathway, which also controls aerotaxis behavior. Modulation of these neuroendocrine pathways by intestinal infection serves as a systemic feedback that enables animals to avoid virulent bacteria. These results reveal how feedback from the intestine during infection can modulate the behavior, learning, and microbial perception of the host.

Data availability

All data generated or analysed during this study are included in the manuscript and supporting files.

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Jogender Singh

    Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
  2. Alejandro Aballay

    Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, United States
    For correspondence
    aballay@ohsu.edu
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-5975-3352

Funding

National Institute of General Medical Sciences (GM0709077)

  • Alejandro Aballay

National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (AI117911)

  • Alejandro Aballay

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Copyright

© 2019, Singh & Aballay

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

Metrics

  • 5,015
    views
  • 651
    downloads
  • 75
    citations

Views, downloads and citations are aggregated across all versions of this paper published by eLife.

Download links

A two-part list of links to download the article, or parts of the article, in various formats.

Downloads (link to download the article as PDF)

Open citations (links to open the citations from this article in various online reference manager services)

Cite this article (links to download the citations from this article in formats compatible with various reference manager tools)

  1. Jogender Singh
  2. Alejandro Aballay
(2019)
Intestinal infection regulates behavior and learning via neuroendocrine signaling
eLife 8:e50033.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.50033

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.50033

Further reading

    1. Immunology and Inflammation
    Alessandra Machado Araujo, Joseph D Dekker ... Haley O Tucker
    Research Article

    We identified a novel mouse plasmacytoid dendritic cell (pDC) lineage derived from the common lymphoid progenitors (CLPs) that is dependent on expression of Bcl11a. These CLP-derived pDCs, which we refer to as ‘B-pDCs’, have a unique gene expression profile that includes hallmark B cell genes, normally not expressed in conventional pDCs. Despite expressing most classical pDC markers such as SIGLEC-H and PDCA1, B-pDCs lack IFN-α secretion, exhibiting a distinct inflammatory profile. Functionally, B-pDCs induce T cell proliferation more robustly than canonical pDCs following Toll-like receptor 9 (TLR9) engagement. B-pDCs, along with another homogeneous subpopulation of myeloid-derived pDCs, display elevated levels of the cell surface receptor tyrosine kinase AXL, mirroring human AXL+ transitional DCs in function and transcriptional profile. Murine B-pDCs therefore represent a phenotypically and functionally distinct CLP-derived DC lineage specialized in T cell activation and previously not described in mice.

    1. Immunology and Inflammation
    Jiansen Lu, Jiahuan Zhang ... Xiao Yu
    Research Article

    Van Gogh-like 2 (Vangl2), a core planar cell polarity component, plays an important role in polarized cellular and tissue morphology induction, growth development, and cancer. However, its role in regulating inflammatory responses remains elusive. Here, we report that Vangl2 is upregulated in patients with sepsis and identify Vangl2 as a negative regulator of The nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-κB) signaling by regulating the protein stability and activation of the core transcription component p65. Mice with myeloid-specific deletion of Vangl2 (Vangl2ΔM) are hypersusceptible to lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced septic shock. Vangl2-deficient myeloid cells exhibit enhanced phosphorylation and expression of p65, therefore, promoting the secretion of proinflammatory cytokines after LPS stimulation. Mechanistically, NF-κB signaling-induced-Vangl2 recruits E3 ubiquitin ligase PDLIM2 to catalyze K63-linked ubiquitination on p65, which serves as a recognition signal for cargo receptor NDP52-mediated selective autophagic degradation. Taken together, these findings demonstrate Vangl2 as a suppressor of NF-κB-mediated inflammation and provide insights into the crosstalk between autophagy and inflammatory diseases.