Neutrophils are innate immune cells that counter pathogens by many mechanisms, including release of antimicrobial proteins such as calprotectin to inhibit bacterial growth. Calprotectin sequesters essential micronutrient metals such as zinc, thereby limiting their availability to microbes, a process termed nutritional immunity. We find that while calprotectin is induced by neutrophils during infection with the gut pathogen Salmonella Typhimurium, calprotectin-mediated metal sequestration does not inhibit S. Typhimurium proliferation. Remarkably, S. Typhimurium overcomes calprotectin-mediated zinc chelation by expressing a high affinity zinc transporter (ZnuABC). A S. Typhimurium znuA mutant impaired for growth in the inflamed gut was rescued in the absence of calprotectin. ZnuABC was also required to promote the growth of S. Typhimurium over that of competing commensal bacteria. Thus, our findings indicate that Salmonella thrives in the inflamed gut by overcoming the zinc sequestration of calprotectin and highlight the importance of zinc acquisition in bacterial intestinal colonization.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 13. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 25 February 2025.
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#3,722,966
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Outputs from Cell Host & Microbe (Science Direct)
#1,626
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Outputs of similar age
#20,829
of 202,783 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Cell Host & Microbe (Science Direct)
#6
of 25 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 34,410,798 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done well and is in the 89th percentile: it's in the top 25% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 3,238 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 49.5. This one is in the 49th percentile – i.e., 49% of its peers scored the same or lower than it.
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We're also able to compare this research output to 25 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done well, scoring higher than 76% of its contemporaries.
