Seminar of the Department of Microbiology
Microscopic analysis of host-pathogen interactions
Dr. Natalia Schiefermeier-Mach - Wissenschaftliche Leiterin, fhg - Zentrum für Gesundheitsberufe, Innsbruck, Austria
15.05.2023, 11:00 - 12:00
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- or in presence the Seminarraum Mikrobiologie (Bauteil V)
Abstract
Attachment, internalization and trafficking of fungal conidia by airway epithelial cells orchestrate conidia clearance mechanisms as well as early immune signalling. These processes strongly depend on plasma membrane mechanics, remodelling of the actin cytoskeleton and activation of integrins. Several studies showed that cellular organization can be reliably controlled using micropatterns coated with extracellular matrix proteins. Therefore, micropatterned substrates could provide an interesting model to characterize molecular events of host-pathogen interactions in space and time. For our project, we have used multi-plane live cell imaging and fluorescent microscopy to analyse the intracellular trafficking of Aspergillus fumigatus and Aspergillus terreus conidia by micropatterned multicellular islands of human alveolar A549 cells stably expressing lysosomal/late endosomal protein LAMP1-NeonGreen. Our ongoing work constitutes a novel model to study host-pathogen interactions allowing high spatial resolution of cellular events to extend our understanding of fungal conidia processing by non-phagocytic cells.