LOS ANGELES, Jan. 31 (UPI) -- University of California-San Diego scientists say toxins that allow anthrax to cause disease and death in mammals have similar effects in fruit flies.
The discovery means fruit flies can be used to study the link between the biochemical activities and physiological effects of anthrax toxins.
Annabel Guichard, a UCSD biologist and lead author of the study, tracked the ways two active anthrax toxins cause cellular damage and death in the fruit fly. The toxins are required for the anthrax bacterium Bacillus anthracis to evade a host immune system and cause disease.
The biologists found anthrax toxins alter the same signaling pathways used for cell communication in fruit flies and humans.
"We knew how anthrax toxins acted on human cells, but this study is the first to show that these toxins are active in fruit flies, suggesting that this fast breeding laboratory animal could also be used to determine the function of a variety of bacterial and viral pathogenic factors," said Guichard.
The research appears in an early online edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
