What is Neisseria Los?

What is Neisseria Los?

Neisseria gonorrhoeae is a gram-negative obligate human pathogen that contains lipooligosaccharide (LOS) as a major constituent within the outer membrane. LOS plays a major role in pathogenesis by inducing host inflammatory responses and also enabling evasion of host innate immunity through sialylation.

Is LOS a virulence factor?

LOS, or endotoxin, including the ability to express a full repertoire of LOS structures, is an important virulence factor involved in multiple steps in the pathogenesis of N. meningitidis and is a significant contributor to the pathologies of meningococcal disease (2-4, 15, 23, 36).

How do you get Neisseria meningitidis?

People spread meningococcal bacteria to other people by sharing respiratory and throat secretions (saliva or spit). Generally, it takes close (for example, coughing or kissing) or lengthy contact to spread these bacteria. Fortunately, they are not as contagious as germs that cause the common cold or the flu.

Is Los an endotoxin?

The exclusive human pathogen Neisseria meningitidis expresses lipooligosaccharide (LOS), an endotoxin that is structurally distinct from the lipopolysaccharides (LPS) of enteric Gram-negative bacilli.

What is los in microbiology?

N. gonorrhoeae expresses lipooligosaccharide (LOS), a phase variable molecule that plays an important role during pathogenesis of the organism.

What is the difference between LPS and LOS?

The key difference between LPS and LOS is that LPS has a very high molecular weight, whereas LOS has a low molecular weight. Both LPS and LOS are bacterial lipopolysaccharides. The term LPS stands for lipopolysaccharide while the term LOS stands for lipooligosaccharide.

Can you get meningococcal from kissing?

Meningococcal disease spreads when people are in very close contact with each other for a long time – for example, kissing intimately or living in the same household. The bacteria can only live outside of the body for a few seconds, so you can’t catch meningococcal disease from casual contact or from the environment.

Does Los have O antigen?

LOS is analogous to the lipopolysaccharide (LPS) found in other Gram-negative families. LOSs share similar lipid A structures with an identical array of functional activities as LPSs. LOSs lack O-antigen units with the LOS oligosaccharide structures limited to 10 saccharide units.

Does Los have lipid A?

Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) or lipooligosaccharide (LOS) is a glycolipid exposed on the surface of the outer membrane. Unlike enteric Gram-negative bacteria it consists only of lipid A and an oligosaccharide part, that lacks O-antigen side chain.

Is Neisseria meningitidis fastidious?

N. meningitidis is a fastidious organism, which grows best at 35-37°C with ~5% CO2 (or in a candle-jar). It can grow on both a blood agar plate (BAP) and a chocolate agar plate (CAP).

Is Neisseria gonorrhoeae shape?

Neisseria gonorrhoeae, the causative agent of gonorrhoea, is a Gram negative, coffee-bean shaped facultative intracellular diplococcus bacterium, the classical sexually transmitted bacteria.