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SUMMARY:Employing Caenorhabditis elegans based models to explore the contr
 ibution to virulence of tRNA gene-associated genomic islands in Pseudomona
 s aeruginosa - Marialuisa Crosatti\, Department of Infection\, Immunity an
 d Inflammation\, University of Leicester
DTSTART:20140814T133000Z
DTEND:20140814T143000Z
UID:TALK53742@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:38484
DESCRIPTION:Pseudomonas aeruginosa is the archetypal opportunistic pathoge
 n adapting to diverse environments in part because of its genome variabili
 ty due to acquisition of genomic islands trough horizontal gene transfer. 
 We propose to use Caenorhabditis elegans and genomic island deletion mutan
 ts created through homologous recombination to investigate the contributio
 n to virulence of genomic islands in clinical isolates. A C. elegans-based
  highthroughput assay (HTA) was established\, validated against a previous
 ly described slow-killing assay (SKA) and employed to screen a panel of P.
  aeruginosa mutants created by deletion of tRNA gene-associated genomic is
 lands. Out of 19 mutant–wild-type pairs tested\, four mutants showed hig
 her HTA scores than partner wild-type strains\, indicative of reduced viru
 lence relative to the comparator strain\; three of these island-minus muta
 nts were also 20 to 50% attenuated in comparison with wild-type when teste
 d in SKA.\n
LOCATION:Seminar Room\, Hammond Building\, Department of Veterinary Medici
 ne
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