A Novel Approach for Detecting Unique Variations among Infectious Bacterial Species in Endocarditic Cardiac Valve Vegetation

Nadji Hannachi (1) , Hubert Lepidi (1, 2) , Anthony Fontanini (1) , Tatsuki Takakura , Jacques Bou-Khalil (1) , Frederique Gouriet (2, 1) , Gilbert Habib (1, 2) , Didier Raoult (1, 2) , Laurence Camoin-Jau (1, 3) , Jean-Pierre Baudoin (1, 2)

1 MEPHI - Microbes évolution phylogénie et infections
2 IHU Marseille - Institut Hospitalier Universitaire Méditerranée Infection
3 APHM - Assistance Publique - Hôpitaux de Marseille

Infectious endocarditis (IE) remains one of the deadliest heart diseases with a high death rate, generally following thrombo-embolic events. Today, therapy is based on surgery and antibiotic therapy. When thromboembolic complications in IE patients persist, this is often due to our lack of knowledge regarding the pathophysiological development and organization of cells in the vegetation, most notably the primordial role of platelets and further triggered hemostasis, which is related to the diversity of infectious microorganisms involved. Our objective was to study the organization of IE vegetations due to different bacteria species in order to understand the related pathophysiological mechanism of vegetation development. We present an approach for ultrastructural analysis of whole-infected heart valve tissue based on scanning electron microscopy and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy. Our approach allowed us to detect differences in cell organization between the analyzed vegetations and revealed a distinct chemical feature inviridans Streptococciones. Our results illustrate the benefits that such an approach may bring for guiding therapy, considering the germ involved for each IE patient.

Mots clés: SEM; EDX; infectious endocarditis; bacteria; vegetation

Domaines: Sciences du Vivant [q-bio]

Nadji Hannachi, Hubert Lepidi, Anthony Fontanini, Tatsuki Takakura, Jacques Bou-Khalil, et al.. A Novel Approach for Detecting Unique Variations among Infectious Bacterial Species in Endocarditic Cardiac Valve Vegetation. Cells, 2020, 9 (8), ⟨10.3390/cells9081899⟩. ⟨hal-03149737⟩