Biochemical and structural studies of protein chaperones in salmonella

该研究项目的目的是了解细菌如何利用其人类和动物宿主在感染过程中使用一个专门的分泌装置称为III型分泌系统的机制。这种分泌系统就像一个分子注射器，将细菌蛋白质直接注入宿主细胞，这样细菌就可以征用细胞进行自己的生长。重要的是，禁用分泌系统使细菌无法感染宿主。我们的研究项目集中在肠道沙门氏菌的III型分泌系统，这种细菌感染了加拿大和世界各地的许多家养食用动物，并导致严重的胃肠道疾病。我们的工作涉及识别和理解称为伴侣的专门细菌蛋白的功能，我们认为这些蛋白在感染期间协调III型分泌系统的组装和功能。这项工作将定义细菌如何使用伴侣蛋白网络最终导致人类和动物疾病的关键机制。

Project Summary - The aim of this research program is to understand the mechanisms of how bacteria exploit their human and animal hosts during infection by using a specialized secretion apparatus called the type III secretion system. This secretion system acts like a molecular syringe to inject bacterial proteins directly into host cells so that the bacteria can commandeer the cell for it's own growth. Importantly, disabling the secretion system render the bacteria unable to infect their hosts. Our research program is focused on the type III secretion system of Salmonella enterica, a bacteria that infects many domesticated food animals in Canada and throughout the world and that causes serious gastrointestinal illness in the humans that it infects. Our work involves identifying and understanding the function of specialized bacterial proteins called chaperones that we believe orchestrate the assembly and function of the type III secretion system during infection. This work will define key mechanisms of how bacteria use chaperone protein networks to ultimately cause disease in humans and animals.