Interactions between host cells and individual pathogenic bacteria determine the clinical severity of disease during systemic infection in humans. Vascular endothelial cells, which line the lumen of blood vessels, represent a critical barrier for a bacterium in the bloodstream. These cells adopt myriad phenotypes that may modulate their susceptibility to infection, however the precise determinants of their heterogeneity in susceptibility are not known. Here, we show that heterogeneity in susceptibility to Listeria monocytogenes infection among primary human vascular endothelial cells (HUVEC) can be entirely attributed to robust, pre-existing host cell heterogeneity in bacterial adhesion, and we find no evidence for significant heterogeneity in later steps of infection. High susceptibility to adhesion decayed rapidly, within 30-60 minutes. Thus, rapidly fluctuating, non-genetic variability in bacterial adhesion diversifies susceptibility to infection, both among host cells and within individual cells over time.

宿主细胞和个体病原菌之间的相互作用决定了人类全身感染期间疾病的临床严重程度。血管内皮细胞排列在血管腔内，是血液中细菌的关键屏障。这些细胞采用无数可能调节其感染易感性的表型，但其易感性异质性的确切决定因素尚不清楚。在这里，我们展示了单核细胞增生李斯特菌易感性的异质性原代人血管内皮细胞 (HUVEC) 之间的感染完全归因于细菌粘附中强大的、预先存在的宿主细胞异质性，我们没有发现在感染的后期步骤中存在显着异质性的证据。对粘附的高敏感性在 30-60 分钟内迅速衰减。因此，随着时间的推移，细菌粘附的快速波动、非遗传变异使宿主细胞之间和单个细胞内的感染易感性多样化。