Helicobacter pylori, the causative agent of gastritis and ulcer disease in humans, secretes a toxin called VacA (vacuolating cytotoxin) into culture supernatants. VacA was initially characterized and purified on the basis of its ability to induce the formation of intracellular vacuoles in tissue culture cells. H. pylori strains possessing different alleles of vacA differ in their ability to exp...

The genetic status of cagA, vacA subtype, iceA1, and babA, and the relationship to gastroduodenal diseases were assessed in Helicobacter pylori isolates in Korea. Seventy-six strains of H. pylori were isolated from the antrum and the corpus of 41 adult patients (22 with peptic ulcer and 19 with gastritis). The cagA, iceA1, and babA genes were assessed by polymerase chain reaction and the vacA s...

The vacuolating cytotoxin and the cytotoxin-associated protein, encoded by vacA and cagA, respectively, are important virulence determinants of Helicobacter pylori. Sixty-five H. pylori strains were isolated from dyspeptic patients (19 with peptic ulcer disease, 43 with chronic gastritis, and 3 with gastric cancer) and studied for differences in the vacA and cagA genes and their relationship to...

Colonization of the stomach mucosa by Helicobacter pylori is a major cause of acute and chronic gastric pathologies in humans. Several H. pylori virulence genes that may play a role in its pathogenicity have been identified. The most important determinants are vacA and cagA in the cag pathogenicity island (cagPAI) genes. In the present study, to consider the association of molecular genetics be...

Helicobacter pylori VacA is a secreted protein toxin that forms channels in lipid bilayers and induces multiple structural and functional alterations in eukaryotic cells. A unique hydrophobic segment at the amino terminus of VacA contains three tandem repeats of a GxxxG motif that is characteristic of transmembrane dimerization sequences. To examine functional properties of this region, we expr...

Pathogenic strains of Helicobacter pylori secrete a cytotoxin, VacA, that in the presence of weak bases, causes osmotic swelling of acidic intracellular compartments enriched in markers for late endosomes and lysosomes. The molecular mechanisms by which VacA causes this vacuolation remain largely unknown. At neutral pH, VacA is predominantly a water-soluble dodecamer formed by two apposing hexa...

Treatment of AZ-521 cells with Helicobacter pylori VacA increased cyclooxygenase 2 (COX-2) mRNA in a time- and dose-dependent manner. A p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) inhibitor, SB203580, blocked elevation of COX-2 mRNA levels, whereas PD98059, which blocks the Erk1/2 cascade, partially suppressed the increase. Consistent with involvement of p38 MAPK, VacA-induced accumulation of C...

The vacuolating cytotoxin VacA is a major virulence factor of Helicobacter pylori, a bacterium responsible for gastroduodenal ulcers and cancer. VacA associates with lipid rafts, is endocytosed, and reaches the late endocytic compartment where it induces vacuolation. We have investigated the endocytic and intracellular trafficking pathways used by VacA, in HeLa and gastric AGS cells. We report ...

UNLABELLED Objective(s) : Helicobacter pylori, a human specific gastric pathogen is a causative agent of chronic active gastritis. The vacuolating cytotoxin (VacA) is an effective virulence factor involved in gastric injury. The aim of this study was to construct a recombinant protein containing antigenic region of VacA gene and determine its antigenicity. MATERIALS AND METHODS The antigenic ...

Mosaicism in vacA alleles with two distinct families of vacA signal sequences (s1 and s2) and two distinct families of middle region alleles (m1 and m2) has been reported. Research suggests that the vacA s1 genotype is closely associated with duodenal ulcer disease and with high cytotoxin production. The aims of this study were to evaluate the role of vacA genotyping with respect to gastric inf...