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Bacterial pathogenesis is the process by which bacteria infect and cause disease in a host. Not all bacteria are pathogens and have the ability for pathogenesis (also known as virulence).
A single exometabolite produced by an opportunistic bacterial pathogen of the root microbiome enhances host susceptibility to salt stress and promotes plant disease in complex soil systems.
Here, Cottam et al. identify an L-arabinose transporter in Enterohaemorrhagic Escherichia coli and show that metabolism of this dietary sugar upregulates the type 3 secretion system, thus enhancing its fitness within the host gut.
This study on how Staphylococcus aureus manipulates host-derived fatty acids reveals that a bacteriallipase (Lip2) converts toxic fatty acids and cholesterol into innocuous cholesteryl esters.
During the influenza pandemic, a large number of deaths resulted from secondary bacterial pneumonia caused by common upper respiratory tract bacteria, such as Staphylococcus. Here, Moon et al, find that the interaction between airway epithelial CD47 and the pathogenic bacterial FnBP is critical in causing bacterial superinfection.
In Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the fitness cost of rifampicin resistance is partially due to excessive RNA polymerase pausing and is rescued by mutations in the pro-pausing transcription factor NusG.
In this study, Sharafutdinov et al. report a single nucleotide polymorphism in the gene encoding the HtrA protease of Helicobacter pylori that is associated with gastric cancer.