Can Invade the Central Nervous System the Olfactory and Trigeminal Nerves and Infect Peripheral Nerve Glial Cells.

can infect the brain and has been linked to late-onset dementia. , which infects mice, is often used to model human chlamydial infections. While it has been suggested to be also important for modelling brain infection, nervous system infection by has not been reported in the literature. has been shown to infect the olfactory bulb in mice after intranasal inoculation, and has therefore been suggested to invade the brain the olfactory nerve; however, nerve infection has not been shown to date. Another path by which certain bacteria can reach the brain is the trigeminal nerve, but it remains unknown whether species can infect this nerve. Other bacteria that can invade the brain the olfactory and/or trigeminal nerve can do so rapidly, however, whether spp. can reach the brain earlier than one-week post inoculation remains unknown. In the current study, we showed that can within 48 h invade the brain the olfactory nerve, in addition to infecting the trigeminal nerve. We also cultured the glial cells of the olfactory and trigeminal nerves and showed that readily infected the cells, constituting a possible cellular mechanism explaining how the bacteria can invade the nerves without being eliminated by glial immune functions. Further, we demonstrated that olfactory and trigeminal glia differed in their responses to , with olfactory glia showing less infection and stronger immune response than trigeminal glia.