Erin P. Smith

Duke University Medical Center | DUMC · Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology

The structure and function of the mammalian gut vary by region, yet why inflammatory diseases manifest in specific regions and not others remains unclear. We use a TNF–overexpressing Crohn′s disease (CD) model (Tnf ΔARE/+ ), which typically presents in the terminal ileum (TI), to investigate how environmental factors interact with the host′s immune...

Invasive microbial pathogens often disrupt epithelial barriers, yet the mechanisms used to dismantle tight junctions are poorly understood. Here, we show that the obligate pathogen Chlamydia trachomatis uses the effector protein TepP to transiently disassemble tight junctions early during infection. TepP alters the tyrosine phosphorylation status o...

Remodeling of host cellular membrane transport pathways is a common pathogenic trait of many intracellular microbes that is essential to their intravacuolar life cycle and proliferation. The bacterium Brucella abortus generates a host endoplasmic reticulum-derived vacuole (rBCV) that supports its intracellular growth, via VirB Type IV secretion sys...

Bacterial pathogens with an intracellular lifestyle modulate many host cellular processes to promote their infectious cycle. They do so by delivering effector proteins into host cells via dedicated secretion systems that target specific host functions. While the roles of many individual effectors are known, how their modes of action are coordinated...

Many intracellular pathogens exploit host secretory trafficking to support their intracellular cycle, but knowledge of these pathogenic processes is limited. The bacterium Brucella abortus uses a type IV secretion system (VirB T4SS) to generate a replication-permissive Brucella-containing vacuole (rBCV) derived from the host ER, a process that requ...

Importance: Many intracellular bacterial pathogens encode specialized secretion systems that deliver effector proteins into host cells to mediate the multiple stages of their intracellular cycles. Because these intracellular events occur sequentially, classical genetic approaches cannot address the late roles that these apparatuses play, as secret...

Gentamicin prevents Brucella reinfection events in BMMs. Representative confocal micrographs show reinfection events in BMMs infected with B. abortus 2308ΔvirB11::virB11i either upon sustained ATc treatment (ATc72h) or following 4 h of ATc preinduction (ATc−4h) and sustained gentamicin (Gm) treatment between 48 and 72 h pi. Cell Tracker Green-label...

Triclosan is a widely used antimicrobial compound and emerging environmental contaminant. Although the role of the gut microbiome in health and disease is increasingly well established, the interaction between environmental contaminants and host microbiome is largely unexplored, with unknown consequences for host health. This study examined the eff...