2. Academic Validation
  3. Bacterial MgrB peptide activates chemoreceptor Fpr3 in mouse accessory olfactory system and drives avoidance behaviour

Bacterial MgrB peptide activates chemoreceptor Fpr3 in mouse accessory olfactory system and drives avoidance behaviour

  • Nat Commun. 2019 Oct 25;10(1):4889. doi: 10.1038/s41467-019-12842-x.
Bernd Bufe 1 2,  Yannick Teuchert 1,  Andreas Schmid 1,  Martina Pyrski 1,  Anabel Pérez-Gómez 1 3,  Janina Eisenbeis 4,  Thomas Timm 5,  Tomohiro Ishii 6 7,  Günter Lochnit 5,  Markus Bischoff 4,  Peter Mombaerts 6,  Trese Leinders-Zufall 1,  Frank Zufall 8
Affiliations

Affiliations

  • 1 Center for Integrative Physiology and Molecular Medicine, Saarland University, 66424, Homburg, Germany.
  • 2 Molecular Immunology Section, Faculty of Computer Science and Microsystems Engineering, University of Applied Sciences Kaiserslautern, Amerikastrasse 1, 66482, Zweibrücken, Germany.
  • 3 Department of Molecular Medicine, The Scripps Research Institute, 10550 N Torrey Pines Road, La Jolla, CA, 92037, USA.
  • 4 Institute for Medical Microbiology and Hygiene, Saarland University, 66424, Homburg, Germany.
  • 5 Protein Analytics, Institute of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, Friedrichstrasse 24, 35392, Giessen, Germany.
  • 6 Max Planck Research Unit for Neurogenetics, Max-von-Laue-Strasse 4, 60438, Frankfurt, Germany.
  • 7 Department of Cell Biology, Graduate School of Medical and Dental Science, Tokyo Medical and Dental University, 1-5-45 Yushima, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-8510, Japan.
  • 8 Center for Integrative Physiology and Molecular Medicine, Saarland University, 66424, Homburg, Germany. [email protected].
PMID: 31653840 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-12842-x
Abstract

Innate immune chemoreceptors of the formyl peptide receptor (Fpr) family are expressed by vomeronasal sensory neurons (VSNs) in the accessory olfactory system. Their biological function and coding mechanisms remain unknown. We show that mouse Fpr3 (Fpr-rs1) recognizes the core peptide motif f-MKKFRW that is predominantly present in the signal sequence of the Bacterial protein MgrB, a highly conserved regulator of virulence and Antibiotic resistance in Enterobacteriaceae. MgrB peptide can be produced and secreted by bacteria, and is selectively recognized by a subset of VSNs. Exposure to the peptide also stimulates VSNs in freely behaving mice and drives innate avoidance. Our data shows that Fpr3 is required for neuronal detection and avoidance of peptides derived from a conserved master virulence regulator of enteric bacteria.

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