Professional Documents
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Edited by:
Christina Maria Joseph Elisabeth
Vandenbroucke-Grauls,
VU University Medical Center,
Netherlands
Reviewed by:
Paras Jain,
Albert Einstein College of Medicine,
USA
Li Xu,
Cornell University, USA
*Correspondence:
Pere-Joan Cardona,
Head of the Unitat de Tuberculosi
Experimental, Fundaci Institut
dInvestigaci en Cincies de la Salut
Germans Trias i Pujol, Crtra de Can
Ruti, Cam de les Escoles, s/n; 08916
Badalona (Barcelona), Catalonia,
Spain
pjcardona@igtp.cat
Specialty section:
This article was submitted to
Infectious Diseases,
a section of the journal
Frontiers in Microbiology
Received: 28 April 2015
Accepted: 02 June 2015
Published: 16 June 2015
Citation:
Cardona P-J (2015) The key role of
exudative lesions and their
encapsulation: lessons learned from
the pathology of human pulmonary
tuberculosis. Front. Microbiol. 6:612.
doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2015.00612
Introduction
In order to be clinically relevant, tuberculosis (TB) lesions must, in general, be radiologically
visible. This means a structure with a diameter of not less than 10 mm that can be discerned
by an experienced radiologist. It is not easy to achieve such a size in human lungs as powerful
local structures, namely the interlobular septae, which enclose secondary lobes, tend to prevent it
(Osborne et al., 1983; Webb, 2006). These structures are stimulated by minimal lesions (0.5 mm
in diameter) (Medlar, 1955; Lindgren, 1961; Gil et al., 2010), thus showing how difficult it is to
overcome this powerful defense. Recent findings concerning the mechanisms that determine the
origin of lesions in active TB have led us to take a more in-depth look at pathological data in human
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2006), thus meaning that only a very low bacillary load can be
detected.
Exudative lesions, or local neutrophilic condensations, are
triggered by a high bacillary load. Infection of the upper lobes
favors their development and represents a higher probability of
generating new lesions as a result of bronchogenic dissemination.
Moreover, their high bacillary load also increases the likelihood
of necrosis, thus forming a large progressive lesion and favoring
liquefaction, sloughing, and cavitation (Pottenger, 1934; Rich,
1944; Pagel and Toussaint, 1948; Canetti, 1955; Medlar, 1955)
(Table 1 and Figure 1).
Interestingly, an increase in the percentage of neutrophils in
peripheral blood has been used as an indicator for TB progression
in the past (Flinn and Flinn, 1930; Pottenger, 1934; Rich, 1944;
Kayne and OShaughnessy, 1948).
Once the infection site has been detected and the immune
response triggered, a very important reaction related to the
quality of the granuloma generated takes place. There is a
widespread consensus that this property is linked to bacillary
load and the site at which infection occurs (Pottenger, 1934;
Rich, 1944; Canetti, 1955; Medlar, 1955). Thus, the proliferative
granuloma, or tubercle, is triggered by a low bacillary load
and contains epithelioid cells and fibroblasts. This lesion soon
progresses to fibrosis and calcification as a result of the
encapsulation process induced by interlobular septae, which
enclose secondary lobes in humans (Osborne et al., 1983; Webb,
Progressing
Internal
Exudative lesions
Bronchogenic
local dissemination
Coalescence of
lesions
External
Abrogating
Exogenous
reinfection
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on the bacillary dose. Thus, when a low dose aerosol is used, the
induction of liquefacted lesions is not predictable and it appears
that bronchogenic dissemination must take place and locally
synchronize in order to coalesce and induce large liquefacting
lesions. In contrast, the inoculation of a relatively large challenge
dose (around 104 CFUs) intravenously consistently induces
infiltration within around 4 weeks post-infection (Driver et al.,
2012; Harper et al., 2012; Vilaplana et al., 2013; Dutta et al.,
2014; Marzo et al., 2014). Obviously, although radiologically
visible lesions cannot be reproduced in this model on a humanlike scale, it can nevertheless give us an idea of the nature of
the lesions induced (proliferative vs. exudative). In fact, those
groups working on these models have paid particular attention
to evaluating control of the bacillary load. But little attention has
been paid to the nature of the lesions. In fact, in the majority of
models, the lesions are essentially proliferative, showing a slow
but constant progression of infiltration due to the lack of an
efficient encapsulation process.
Although guinea-pigs (GP) are more reactive and tend to
generate both proliferative and exudative lesions, they show an
overwhelming implication of the lymphatic system that finally
becomes larger and more fibrosed than the lungs, eventually
resulting in a quick and overwhelming systemic progression
(Basaraba et al., 2006). Medium-sized mammals such as NHP and
rabbits also show this constant progression, which in some cases
can cause liquefaction of the lesions (Medlar, 1955; Dannenberg,
2006; Flynn et al., 2015).
The fact that they have more volume allows large,
radiologically visible lesions to form in these hosts, although
the lack of interlobular septae means they have insufficient tools
to fight the disease. Interlobular septae are only present in big
mammals, such as cattle, goats and pigs, therefore only these
hosts will be able to answer the question as to what extent the
encapsulation process is relevant or not. In our hands, using the
minipig model, we have shown that even lesions smaller than
0.5 mm can be encapsulated in less than 2 weeks. This means
that encapsulation is a quite quick process (Gil et al., 2010).
The scenario resembles the situation that has been described
extensively in humans (Pottenger, 1934; Rich, 1944; Kayne
and OShaughnessy, 1948; Canetti, 1950; Medlar, 1955), clearly
indicating that this is a relevant factor that should be taken into
account.
The main drawback of all models is that they are based on a
single infection, which is not usually the case in the induction of
active TB. As such, it would be important to study the influence
of multiple reinfection in large mammals in order to be able to
better model the human TB process (Fox et al., 2013; Cardona
and Vilaplana, 2014).
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Acknowledgments
This work has been supported by the Catalan Government
and the Spanish Government through the CIBER CRP-TB and
FIS PI14/01038. This review has been partially presented at
the workshop Immunopathology of Tuberculosis celebrated
at the Mycobacteria Research Laboratories Colorado State
University, Fort Collins (USA) and at the 4th Global Forum
on TB Vaccines celebrated at Shangai (China), both on
April 2015.
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Conflict of Interest Statement: The author declares that the research was
conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could
be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
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