Contribution of Coagulase and Its Regulator SaeRS to Lethality of CA-MRSA 923 Bacteremia.

Coagulase is a critical factor for distinguishing and coagulase-negative Staphylococcus. Our previous studies demonstrated that the null mutation of coagulase () or its direct regulator, SaeRS, significantly enhanced the ability of S (CA-MRSA 923) to survive in human blood in vitro. This led us to further investigate the role of coagulase and its direct regulator, SaeRS, in the pathogenicity of CA-MRSA 923 in bacteremia during infection. In this study, we found that the null mutation of significantly decreased the mortality of CA-MRSA 923; moreover, the single null mutation of and the double deletion of / abolished the virulence of CA-MRSA 923. Moreover, the mice infected with either the knockout or the / double knockout mutant exhibited fewer histological lesions and less neutrophils infiltration in the infected kidneys compared to those infected with the knockout mutant or their parental control. Furthermore, we examined the impact of and on bacterial survival in vitro. The null mutation of had no impact on bacterial survival in mice blood, whereas the deletion mutation of or / significantly enhanced bacterial survival in mice blood. These data indicate that SaeRS plays a key role in the lethality of CA-MRSA 923 bacteremia, and that coagulase is one of the important virulence factors that is regulated by SaeRS and contributes to the pathogenicity of CA-MRSA 923.