{"doi":"10.1128/mbio.02569-21","title":"Host Stress Signals Stimulate Pneumococcal Transition from Colonization to Dissemination into the Lungs","abstract":"Microbes acquire unique lifestyles under different environmental conditions. Although this is a widespread occurrence, our knowledge of the importance of various host signals and their impact on microbial behavior is not clear despite the therapeutic value of this knowledge. We discovered that catecholamine stress hormones are the host signals that trigger the passage of Streptococcus pneumoniae from a commensal to a parasitic state. We identify that stress hormone treatment of this microbe leads to reductions in cell size and capsule synthesis and renders it more able to migrate from the nasopharynx into the lungs in a mouse model of infection. The microbe requires the TCS09 protein for the recognition and processing of stress hormone signals. Our work has particular clinical significance as catecholamines are abundant in upper respiratory fluids as well as being administered therapeutically to reduce inflammation in ventilated patients, which may explain why intubation in the critically ill is a recognized risk factor for the development of pneumococcal pneumonia.","journal":"mBio","year":2021,"id":192418,"datarank":0.6599500595038793,"base_score":2.5649493574615367,"endowment":2.5649493574615367,"self_citation_contribution":0.38474240361923057,"citation_network_contribution":0.27520765588464874,"self_endowment_contribution":0.38474240361923057,"citer_contribution":0.27520765588464874,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":12,"citer_count":12,"citers_with_citation_signal":10,"citers_with_endowment":10,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9512,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":759486,"name":"Hastyar Najmuldeen","orcid":"0000-0002-7710-6845","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":730651,"name":"Banaz O. Kareem","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":760181,"name":"Bushra Shlla","orcid":null,"position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":760182,"name":"Vitor E. Fernandes","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":760183,"name":"Morten Danielsen","orcid":null,"position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":760184,"name":"Julian M. Ketley","orcid":null,"position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":760185,"name":"Primrose Freestone","orcid":null,"position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":470951,"name":"Hasan Yeşilkaya","orcid":"0000-0003-3617-1437","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":760180,"name":"Fayez Alghofaili","orcid":null,"position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":49,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:49:43.496702Z","pmid":"34696596","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}