Adhesion activity of Campylobacter jejuni for intestinal epithelial cells and mucus and erythrocytes

Live and formalin- or heat (100 degrees C, 30 min)-treated cells of Campylobacter jejuni strains Y6878 and Y6817, and the supernatant of the heat-treated bacterial suspension had agglutinating activity for the intestinal epithelial cells of Japanese quails and human (INT407). Among the erythrocytes derived from 7 animal species (human, horses, sheep, rabbits, mice, chickens, and quails), only rabbit erythrocytes were agglutinated by live and glutaraldehyde-, formalin-, or heat-treated cells of 15 strains of C. jejuni examined. The treated and non-treated C. jejuni strains Y6878 and Y6817 did not agglutinate formalin- or glutaraldehyde-fixed rabbit erythrocytes. Flagellar fraction of strains Y6878 and Y6817 showed no hemagglutinating activity for non-fixed rabbit erythrocytes. The supernatant of heat-treated strain Y6878 also had the adhesion activity for the intestinal mucus derived from the Japanese quails. It was found that hemagglutination using rabbit erythrocytes is a simple and useful tool for the study of C. jejuni adhesion factor and that the adhesion factor of C. jejuni is the formalin-, glutaraldehyde-, and heat-resistant substances existing on the bacterial surface. It was suggested that the hemagglutination for the detection of adhesion factor may require the intact receptors on the surface of rabbit erythrocytes.