ABSTRACT
Abstract Tuberculosis (TB) has plagued mankind for millennia, and with more than two million deaths annually it remains in the upper-most echelon of infectious killers. Central to the pathogenic success of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) is its ability to persist within humans for long periods without causing any overt disease symptoms. A positive tuberculin skin test and/or chest X-ray indicative of MTB infection in the absence of disease symptoms define the clinical syndrome known as latent tuberculosis. Current models state that oxygen tension within the host is critical to the balance between latent TB and active disease, but several aspects of these models including the role of hypoxia are still untested. In this chapter we summarize and critically review the data accumulated over many decades associating TB with oxygen tension. We highlight both the strong evidence linking oxygen levels with MTB growth and disease as well as the substantial gaps in our understanding of TB latency.
