Utility of LOV-based Fluorescent Reporters To Monitor the Real-Time Secretion and Localisation of Bacterial Effector Proteins

该项目旨在开发和测试我们一直在研究的一种新型荧光标记。这被称为LOV，代表“光、氧、电压”。我们正在研究一种LOV形式，它在蓝光激发下发出强烈的绿色荧光。我们认为LOV可以作为绿色荧光蛋白(GFP)的替代品，绿色荧光蛋白在生物学中被广泛应用，包括研究蛋白质折叠、蛋白质运输、RNA动力学和对感染的反应。在这个项目中，我们将测试LOV是否可以被用来‘标记’由细菌制造的蛋白质，然后通过一个专门的分泌系统注入宿主细胞。该项目通过使用来自三个不同的首席科学家的专业知识来加强：Chrisitie博士是一名生物化学家，他领导了LOV在生物学新领域的应用研究；Roe博士是一名微生物学家，致力于基因调控和细菌与宿主细胞的相互作用；Enninga博士是一名著名的合作者，他是细菌蛋白质成像的专家。

The project aims to develop and test a novel fluorescent marker that we have been working on. This is called LOV, which stands for 'Light, Oxygen, Voltage'. We work on a form of LOV which emits a strong green fluorescence upon blue light excitation. We believe that LOV might act as an alternative to green fluorescent protein (GFP), used extensively in biology for many applications including the study of protein folding, protein transport, RNA dynamics and responses to infection. In this project we will test to see if LOV can be used to 'tag' proteins that are made by bacteria and then injected into host cells by a dedicated secretion system. The project is strengthened by using expertise from 3 different lead scientists: Dr Chrisitie is a biochemist who has led research on the application of LOV in novel areas of biology, Dr Roe is a microbiologist working on gene regulation and bacterial-host cell interactions and Dr Enninga, a named collaborator, is a specialist in imaging bacterial proteins.