Pathogen Interaction
E. histolytica may modulate the virulence of certain human viruses and is itself a host for its own viruses.
For example, AIDS accentuates the damage and pathogenicity of E. histolytica. On the other hand, cells infected with HIV are often consumed by E. histolytica. Infective HIV remains viable within the amoeba, although fortunately there has been no proof of human reinfection from amoeba carrying this virus.
A burst of research on viruses of E. histolytica stems from a series of papers published by Diamond et al. from 1972 to 1979. In 1972, they hypothesized two separate polyhedral and filamentous viral strains within E. histolytica that caused cell lysis. Perhaps the most novel observation was that two kinds of viral strains existed, and that within one type of amoeba (strain HB-301) the polyhedral strain had no detrimental effect but led to cell lysis in another (strain HK-9). Although Mattern et al. attempted to explore the possibility that these protozoal viruses could function like bacteriophages, they find no significant changes in Entamoeba histolytica virulence when infected by viruses. However, no newer published research has been conducted on this species since.
Read more about this topic: Entamoeba Histolytica
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