Regulation of surface architecture by symbiotic bacteria mediates host colonization.

ABSTRACT: Microbes occupy countless ecological niches in nature. Sometimes these environments may be on or within another organism, as is the case in both microbial infections and symbiosis of mammals. Unlike pathogens that establish opportunistic infections, hundreds of human commensal bacterial species establish a lifelong cohabitation with their hosts. Although many virulence factors of infectious bacteria have been described, the molecular mechanisms used during beneficial host-symbiont colonization remain almost entirely unknown. The novel identification of multiple surface polysaccharides in the important human symbiont Bacteroides fragilis raised the critical question of how these molecules contribute to commensalism. To understand the function of the bacterial capsule during symbiotic coloni

SUBMITTER: Liu CH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2268772 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature