Antibodies
Monoclonal antibodies to LpqH and PstS-1 were obtained from BEI Resources (Manassas, VA, USA). A monoclonal antibody to Apa was developed in our laboratory. A polyclonal antiserum to LprG was donated by Dr. Clara Espitia (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City).
Culture of Mycobacterium bovis/BCG under phosphate deprivation conditions
The method of Braibant et al. was followed [14]. Briefly, M. bovis/BCG was cultured in Sauton medium with K2HPO4 (0.5 g/L) at 37°C, until optic density of 460 was reached. Thereafter, aliquots were taken and inoculated in Sauton medium that was supplemented with an excess of K2HPO4 to a final concentration of 3 g/L; the mycobacteria were cultured at 37°C until optic density of 460 was reached. After that, two aliquots were rinsed, centrifuged at 6,000g, and inoculated in Sauton medium. One aliquot was cultured without K2HPO4 and the other with 0.5 g/L K2HPO4. After 24 h of culture, bacilli were collected, rinsed with TBS and frozen until use.
Phagocytosis assays with phosphate-deprived mycobacteria
We carried assays with mycobacteria that were grown with and without Pi as described above. The Balb/c-derived murine macrophage-like tumor cell line J774A.1 was obtained from the American Type Culture Collection (Manassas, VA, USA). Cells were cultured in RPMI 1640 supplemented with 10% fetal calf serum. MOs (5 x105) were incubated with PKH26 labeled bacilli at 1:2, 1:5, and 1:20 MOI, at 37ºC for 4 h. After extensive rinsing with PBS, the cells were fixed in 4% paraformaldehyde in PBS for 20 min. For immunofluorescence microscopy, cytospin slides were mounted with ProLong Antifade with DAPI (Invitrogen, Eugene, OR, USA) and examined with a Nikon epifluorescence microscope. Phagocytosis was analyzed by FACS. At least 10,000 cells were analyzed in a FACSClibur (Becton Dickinson, San Jose CA, USA) operating with FlowJo 7 software and a 488 nm argon laser. The gates were set following established forward and side scatter parameters.
Analysis of the mycobacterial viability after phagocytosis
Assays to verify the viability of phagocytosed mycobacteria were carried out. After 4 h phagocytosis of mycobacteria at 1:10 and 1:20 MOIs, MOs were recovered in TBS, lysed with 0.1 % sodium deoxycholate for 5 min, and centrifuged twice at 12,000 rpm for 10 min. Thereafter, to assess viability the LIVE/DEAD Baclight bacterial viability Kit (Molecular Probes) was used following the manufacturer instructions. Afterward, bacilli were fixed in 4 % paraformaldehyde for 20 min, rinsed in TBS and analyzed by flow cytometry. Because both live and dead cells exhibit green fluorescence, the log-integrated green fluorescence was adjusted to eliminate debris. Populations of bacteria were discriminated as two regions of the log-integratedred fluorescence, and the numbers of bacteria found within these regions were used to estimate the percentage of viable organisms in the population.
Binding/phagocytosis assays with microbeads coated with mycobacterial membrane proteins
We assessed a possible role of mycobacterial membrane proteins in the phagocytosis of mycobacteria employing green fluorescent Polystyrene 1 μm microbeads (Molecular Probes, Eugene, OR, USA) coated with plasma membrane proteins obtained from mycobacteria grown with and without Pi. Microbeads and 500 μg membrane proteins were mixed in 1 mL MES Buffer 2-[N-morpholino] ethane sulfonic acid (pH 6). After that, 1-ethyl-3-(3-dimethylamine nopropyl)-carbodiimide was added to a 2.5/ml final concentration. After overnight incubation, 100 mM glycine was added to stop the reaction. To block remaining reactive sites, microbeads were rinsed with PBS and kept at 4°C in PBS containing 1% BSA. For phagocytosis assays, 5 x 105 MOs were cultured in RPMI 1640 with 10% heat-inactivated FBS and placed on acid-washed glass coverslips. Microbeads were added to cells at a 1:20 rate and incubated for 4 h at 37°C in 5% CO2. The slides were rinsed in PBS to remove non-adherent microbeads and fixed in 1% paraformaldehyde for 10 min.
Phagosome maturation after phagocytosis of mycobacteria
For these analyses bacilli grown with and without PI were labeled green with fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC). Briefly, 50 μl of a bacilli suspension was suspended in 950 μl carbonate buffer 0.1 M, pH 9 and 0.5 mg FITC were added for 2 h. To finish labeling the mycobacteria were centrifuged at 10,500g for 10 min and rinsed 3 times in PBS. To examine whether Pi deprived mycobacteria acquired the ability to alter phagosome maturation, we use the acidotropic dye LysoTracker Red DND-99 (Molecular Probes, Eugene, OR). After rinsing, FITC labeled mycobacteria were added for 4 h at a 1:10 MOI. In a final step, LysoTracker was added in RPMI (1:20,000) for 20 min before phagocytosis was finished. MOs were rinsed, fixed with 4% paraformaldehyde and placed in glass slides. To verify LysoTracker labeling slides were examined by immunofluorescence microscopy. Besides, we quantitated by FACS the extent of LysoTracker phagosome labeling and the phagocytosis of FITC labeled bacilli.
Isolation of mycobacterial plasma membranes to identify proteins expressed during phosphate deprivation
Mycobacteria were grown with and without Pi as described above. To obtain mycobacterial plasma membranes we followed a published method [16]. Briefly, in a lysis buffer containing protease inhibitors, bacilli were sonicated at 60 kHz in iced water (20 cycles 1 min each) and centrifuged at 1000g and the supernatant was centrifuged at 27, 000g; the supernatant obtained was centrifuged at 100,000g to obtain in the pellet the plasma membranes. Protein concentration was measured by the Lowry protein assay (Bio-Rad Laboratories, Hercules, CA, USA). To identify membrane proteins were separated by 12% SDS-PAGE, stained with Coomassie blue, transferred to PVDF membranes and incubated with a rabbit antiserum to M. bovis/BCG. Isolated plasma membranes were identified with a mAb to LpqH and PstS-1 (donated by BEI Resources (Manassas, VA, USA), and to APA (developed in our laboratory) and with a polyclonal antiserum to LprG (donated by PhD Clara Espitia); bound antibodies were detected with goat anti-mouse and a goat anti-rabbit IgG antibodies labeled with horseradish peroxidase. The reactive bands were visualized by chemiluminescence with SuperSignal West Dura kit (Pierce, Rockford, IL, USA).