[27] Adhesion properties of Helicobacter pylori

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the adhesion properties of Helicobacter pylori ( H. pylori ). H. pylori is the etiological agent of chronic type B gastritis. Electron micrographs of antral biopsies show H. pylori adheres to the apical membrane of mucus-secreting gastric epithelial cells; adhesion is characterized by intimate contact between the bacterial cell and the host cell membrane, often in the form of adhesin pedestals, and rearrangement of microskeletal cell proteins. Different in vitro adhesion assays that employ cell types of human origin or from other animal species have been used to study H. pylori adhesin phenotypes. Other in situ adhesion methods use human-gastric-antral biopsies in the form of tissue explants or thin sections of either frozen or paraffin-embedded tissue. Studies of H. pylori adhesin phenotypes after infection of experimental animals have also been used. In vitro H. pylori adhesion model systems are emphasized in the chapter.