Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Ernst, Florian D
• van Vliet, Arnoud H. M
• Kist, Manfred
• Kusters, Johannes G
• Bereswill, Stefan
• Sigel, Roland K. O
• Sigel, Helmut
• Sigel, Astrid

Titel

The Role of Nickel in Environmental Adaptation of the Gastric Pathogen Helicobacter pylori

Ist Teil von

• Nickel and Its Surprising Impact in Nature, 2007, p.545-579

Ort / Verlag

Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

Erscheinungsjahr

2007

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

Wiley-Blackwell Online Books - All Titles (includes Withdrawn titles)

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Diseases of the upper intestinal tract represent a common problem that nearly everybody encounters during life. Before the discovery of the gastric pathogen Helicobacter pylori, such disorders remained debilitating and incurable in many cases. The first report on spiral bacteria in the stomach of non‐human mammals dates back over 100 years. However, scientific proof for bacteria as causes for gastric diseases did not come until 1982, when Robin Warren and Barry Marshall, together with the local microbiologists, isolated H. pylori from gastric biopsy samples. Marshall fulfilled Koch's postulates for H. pylori in a self‐infection experiment. The identification of H. pylori infection as causative agent of gastric and duodenal disorders was a major breakthrough in gastroenterology, for which Marshall and Warren were awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine in 2005. This discovery offered not only a novel idea for the understanding of mechanisms underlying gastritis, ulcerations, lymphomas, and gastric cancer, but also for the treatment of gastric diseases by antimicrobial therapy. In this review, we focus on the essential role of H. pylori nickel ion metabolism and metal ion homeostasis in gastric adaptation and highlight the extraordinary role of nickel in acid resistance required for both primary colonization and long‐term survival in the hostile gastric niche. As H. pylori uses nickel‐cofactored enzymes as first‐line defense, the nickel metabolism represents a potential drug target. Therefore, we discuss three possible new lines of treatment: vaccination, inhibition of enzymes of the H. pylori metal metabolism, and a metal diet.