LOSS OF HELICOBACTER-PYLORI HEMAGGLUTINATION WITH SERIAL LABORATORY PASSAGE AND CORRELATION OF HEMAGGLUTINATION WITH GASTRIC EPITHELIAL-CELL ADHERENCE

Adherence of Helicobacter pylori to gastric epithelial cells is though t to be important in the pathogenesis of infection and may be essentia l to maintain lifelong colonization, However, the factors responsible for adherence to gastric epithelial cells in vivo have not been charac terized, and the significance of adherence to standard epithelial cell lines is unclear, Hemagglutination is also thought to be important in H. pylori adherence, However, no studies have clearly linked H. pylor i hemagglutination or adherence to cultured epithelial cells to primar y gastric epithelial cell adherence, Furthermore, it is not clear whet her laboratory strains which have undergone multiple passages lose pot ential colonization factors, In this study, we examined the effect of serial laboratory passage on hemagglutination and correlated the hemag glutination characteristics of H. pylori strains to primary gastric ce ll adherence, Variable expression of hemagglutination was seen with se rial laboratory passage of 15 strains, After 100 serial laboratory pas sages, all strains had lost hemagglutination activity, Hemagglutinatio n was seen in association with adherence to primary gastric cells in v itro isolated from 2 patients, An association with ultrastructural int imate adherence was seen with HEp-2 cells, but not with gastric adenoc arcinoma cells, Ultrastructural adherence was seen in corresponding an tral biopsies of patients whose strains were hemagglutination positive , but hemagglutination was not associated with gastric inflammation, T hese data indicate that H. pylori hemagglutination is lost with serial passage and that hemagglutination may play a role in the attachment o f H. pylori to gastric epithelial cells, but the role of adherence to chronic gastric inflammation is unclear.