Halmos Faculty, Students Publish Article on Bacterial Inhibitors
Growth characteristics of Yersinia pestis wild-type (wt) and ΔyscF strains on MOX agar incubated at room temperature (RT) or 37°C for 48 h. Colonies of the wt are seen growing on MOX agar incubated at RT but not at 37°C, the temperature at which type III secretion is induced (top). Colonies of the ΔyscF strain, which does not have a functional type III secretion system, are seen growing on the MOX agar incubated at RT and at 37°C (bottom).
Several bacteria use needle-like structures called type III secretion systems (T3SS) to avoid our immune systems by injecting toxins into our cells and causing disease. If the T3SS is blocked, then these bacteria cannot cause the infection, making these structures an attractive target for new antibiotics.
Written by undergraduate students and Halmos College of Arts and Sciences biological sciences faculty member Julie Torruellas Garcia, Ph.D., this paper discusses a new method developed in Garcia’s lab to detect inhibition of bacterial type III secretion systems by small molecules. This method may be useful for screening additional small molecules that target bacterial T3SSs to potentially be used as new treatments for antibiotic resistant bacterial infections.
Undergraduate students (now alumni) co-authors on this paper include Sukriti Prashar, Miguel Portales Guemes, Poorandai Shivbaran, Eugenia Jimenez Alvarez, Christopher Soha, Samir Nacer, and Michael McDonough.
The article, titled “Novel Disk Diffusion Assay on Magnesium Oxalate Agar To Evaluate the Susceptibility of Yersinia pestis to Type III Secretion System Inhibitors” was published in June 2021 in the ASM Journal Microbiology Spectrum. Learn more