{"doi":"10.17615/3p6y-ns77","title":"The Dependence of the Yersinia pestis Capsule on Pathogenesis Is Influenced by the Mouse Background","abstract":"ABSTRACT Yersinia pestis is a highly pathogenic Gram-negative organism and the causative agent of bubonic and pneumonic plague. Y . pestis is capable of causing major epidemics; thus, there is a need for vaccine targets and a greater understanding of the role of these targets in pathogenesis. Two prime Y . pestis vaccine candidates are the usher-chaperone fimbriae Psa and Caf. Herein we report that Y . pestis requires, in a nonredundant manner, both PsaA and Caf1 to achieve its full pathogenic ability in both pneumonic and bubonic plague in C57BL/6J mice. Deletion of psaA leads to a decrease in the organ bacterial burden and to a significant increase in the 50% lethal dose (LD 50 ) after subcutaneous infection. Deletion of caf1 also leads to a significant decrease in the organ bacterial burden but more importantly leads to a significantly greater increase in the LD 50 than was observed for the Δ psaA mutant strain after subcutaneous infection of C57BL/6J mice. Furthermore, the degree of attenuation of the Δ caf1 mutant strain is mouse background dependent, as the Δ caf1 mutant strain was attenuated to a lesser degree in BALB/cJ mice by the subcutaneous route than in C57BL/6J mice. This observation that the degree of requirement for Caf1 is dependent on the mouse background indicates that the virulence of Y . pestis is dependent on the genetic makeup of its host and provides further support for the hypothesis that PsaA and Caf1 have different targets.","journal":"UNC Libraries","year":2020,"id":116278,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":2,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9637,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2020-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":544823,"name":"Eric H. Weening","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":544824,"name":"Greer E. Kaufman","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":295152,"name":"Matthew B. Lawrenz","orcid":"0000-0003-1505-5429","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":543988,"name":"P. A. Price","orcid":"0000-0003-0511-0228","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":288800,"name":"William E. Goldman","orcid":"0000-0002-1551-6718","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":249687,"name":"Virginia L. Miller","orcid":"0000-0002-9522-1767","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":544822,"name":"Jason S. Cathelyn","orcid":null,"position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":0,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:13:44.286758Z","pmid":null,"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":[]}