Cytokine-inducing glycolipids in the lipoteichoic acid fraction from Enterococcus hirae ATCC 9790

Five high molecular weight glycolipids capable of stimulating human peripheral whole-blood cell cultures to cause interleukin 6 (IL-6) and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α induction were isolated from one of the lipoteichoic acid fractions (LTA-2) extracted from Enterococcus hirae ATCC 9790 (Tsutsui et al., (1991) FEMS Microbiol. Immunol. 76, 211-218) by a combination of hydrophobic interaction and anion-exchange chromatographies. This purification procedure resulted in a remarkable increase in the cytokine-inducing activities on the weight basis of isolated glycolipids (a maximum of 36- and 17-fold increases of IL-6 and TNF-α induction, respectively). The total yield of these bioactive glycolipids amounted to 6 wt% of the parent LTA-2 fraction, while the recovery rate in terms of the cytokine-inducing activities was estimated to be sufficient. The chemical composition and the profile, using SDS-PAGE, revealed that all of the isolated bioactive components were high molecular weight glycolipids, which were distinct from each other and from the parent LTA-2 fraction. These findings suggest that the IL-6 and TNF-α-inducing activities previously noted in the parent LTA-2 fraction are not attributable to a chemical entity, the structure of which had been proposed elsewhere (Fischer, W. (1990) in Glycolipids, Phosphoglycolipids and Sulfoglycolipids (Kates, M. ed.) pp. 123-234, Plenum Press, New York), but to the other high molecular weight glycolipids described here.