Description:

Title: Regulation and Mechanism of Vibrio cholerae-chitin Interactions  

Speaker:  Ankur Dalia, PhD, Associate Professor of Biology 
Indiana University

Topic:

The facultative pathogen Vibrio cholerae naturally resides in the aquatic environment, but can cause the diarrheal disease cholera if ingested by a human host. In the aquatic environment, V. cholerae commonly binds to the chitinous shells of crustacean zooplankton. It can then secrete enzymes that degrade chitin into soluble oligosaccharides, which in turn it consumes as a source of carbon and nitrogen. Also, chitin oligosaccharides are critical for inducing the genes required for horizontal gene transfer by natural transformation. Thus, Vibrio-chitin interactions contribute to the survival and evolution of this pathogen in its environmental reservoir. The Dalia lab studies the regulation, mechanisms, and downstream consequences of chitin-induced behaviors in V. cholerae. This work also provides fundamental insights into conserved bacterial processes including signal transduction, gene regulation, extracellular surface appendages called type IV pili, and homologous recombination. 

Host: Hank Seifert, PhD, Professorr, Dept. of Microbiology-Immunology