Flick of a switch: regulatory mechanisms allowing Listeria monocytogenes to transition from a saprophyte to a killer.

Flick of a switch: regulatory mechanisms allowing Listeria monocytogenes to transition from a saprophyte to a killer.
Microbiology. 2019 May 20;:
Authors: Tiensuu T, Guerreiro DN, Oliveira AH, O'Byrne C, Johansson J
Abstract
In contrast to obligate intracellular pathogens that can remain in relatively stable host-associated environments, the soil-living bacterial pathogen Listeria monocytogenes has to sense and respond to physical and chemical cues in a variety of quite different niches. In particular, the bacterium has to survive the dramatic transition from its saprophytic existence to life within the host where nutritional stress, increased temperature, acidity, osmotic stress and the host defences present a new and challenging landscape. This review focuses on the σB and PrfA regulatory systems used by L. monocytogenes to sense the changing environment and implement survival mechanisms that help to overcome the disparate conditions within the host, but also to switch from a harmless saprophyte to an impressively effective pathogen.
PMID: 31107205 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

Source: Microbiology - May 19, 2019 Category: Microbiology Authors: Tiensuu T, Guerreiro DN, Oliveira AH, O'Byrne C, Johansson J Tags: Microbiology Source Type: research