Expression of urease does not affect the ability of Bordetella bronchiseptica to colonise and persist in the murine respiratory tract

To investigate the role played by urease during the Bordetella bronchisepti ca infection process, the ability to colonise and persist in the mouse resp iratory tract of a urease-negative B. bronchiseptica BB7865 and a BB7865 de rivative constitutively expressing urease was compared with that of the wil d-type strain. The results obtained showed that neither constitutive expres sion nor abolishment of urease activity had any significant effect on the c ourse of B. bronchiseptica infection. Therefore, under our experimental con ditions, urease is not essential for B. bronchiseptica to colonise and pers ist within the murine host. (C) 1999 Federation of European Microbiological Societies. Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.