Antibody-Cleaving Neisseria

Abstract
Pathogenic micro-organisms that cause repeated episodes of acute infection must be able to evade a variety of host defenses. For this purpose, one standard microbial strategy is to evolve a variety of distinctive surface antigens. Recently, several investigators have shown that in different strains of gonococci there is great variability in several important antigens, including pili,1 outer-membrane proteins2 and lipopolysaccharides,3 , 4 which could explain why certain intrepid persons have been infected by gonococci on 20 or more separate occasions.In this issue of the Journal, Mulks and Plaut5 describe another and more surprising mechanism by which gonococci and meningococci may . . .

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