Czech Society for Mass Spectrometry

(Czech Mass Spectrometry Conference 2021 - PL-02)
Infection metallomics

Vladimír Havlíček ^1 *

1. Mikrobiologický ústav AV ČR, v.v.i.

Abstract

Infection metallomics is a mass spectrometry (MS) platform established based on the central concept that microbial metallophores are specific and sensitive biomarkers of invasive infectious diseases. During infection in critically ill patients, the pathogen activates secondary bacterial, mycobacterial, and fungal metabolism, leading to the production of metallophores increasing its chance of survival in the host. Here, clinical applications of metallophores in medical microbiology from historical and functional perspectives will be reviewed and under-studied and emerging applications with high diagnostic potential for the post-covid era will be discussed [1,2].
MS with isotope data filtering is central to infection metallomics; it has been used to study the interplay between "frenemies" in hosts and to monitor the dynamic response of the microbiome to antibiotic and antimycotic therapies. Infection metallomics was used for the noninvasive diagnosis of invasive aspergillosis. An array of triacetylfusarinine C (TafC)/ferricrocin (FC)/gliotoxin (Gtx) was detected in a cohort of 35 patients (13 positive and 22 controls). In the clinical study of critically ill, mostly non-neutropenic humans, the TafC/FC/Gtx sensitivity in urine was 100% compared to standard GM in serum (36%). Further, invasive coinfection of A. fumigatus with carbapenem-resistant P. aeruginosa was noninvasively detected in humans by monitoring levels of the respective siderophore, TafC and bacterial pyoverdin E, pyochelin, and 2-heptyl-4-quinolone [3]. MS may also discriminate invasion from benign colonization based on well-defined thresholds distinguishing proliferation from the colonization steady state.

* Corresponding author: vlhavlic@biomed.cas.cz

References

1. Petrik M. et al.: Eur. J. Nucl. Med. Mol. Imaging 48, 372-382 (2021)
2. Patil R.H. et al.: J Fungi 7, 497 (2021)
3. Patil R.H. et al.: J Fungi 7, 730 (2021)

Acknowledgement:

Supported by Czech Science Foundation, grant No. 21-17044S.