AUTHOR=Chai Qiyao , Zhang Yong , Liu Cui Hua 

TITLE=Mycobacterium tuberculosis: An Adaptable Pathogen Associated With Multiple Human Diseases

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology

VOLUME=8

YEAR=2018

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/cellular-and-infection-microbiology/articles/10.3389/fcimb.2018.00158

DOI=10.3389/fcimb.2018.00158

ISSN=2235-2988

ABSTRACT=<p><italic>Mycobacterium tuberculosis</italic>, the etiological agent of tuberculosis (TB), is an extremely successful pathogen that adapts to survive within the host. During the latency phase of infection, <italic>M. tuberculosis</italic> employs a range of effector proteins to be cloud the host immune system and shapes its lifestyle to reside in granulomas, sophisticated, and organized structures of immune cells that are established by the host in response to persistent infection. While normally being restrained in immunocompetent hosts, <italic>M. tuberculosis</italic> within granulomas can cause the recrudescence of TB when host immunity is compromised. Aside from causing TB, accumulating evidence suggests that <italic>M. tuberculosis</italic> is also associated with multiple other human diseases, such as pulmonary complications, autoimmune diseases, and metabolic syndromes. Furthermore, it has been recently appreciated that <italic>M. tuberculosis</italic> infection can also reciprocally interact with the human microbiome, which has a strong link to immune balance and health. In this review, we highlight the adaptive survival of <italic>M. tuberculosis</italic> within the host and provide an overview for regulatory mechanisms underlying interactions between <italic>M. tuberculosis</italic> infection and multiple important human diseases. A better understanding of how <italic>M. tuberculosis</italic> regulates the host immune system to cause TB and reciprocally regulates other human diseases is critical for developing rational treatments to better control TB and help alleviate its associated comorbidities.</p>