Year: 2024
Type: article
Abstract: Intracellular tick-borne bacteria like Rickettsia spp. rely on secreted effector proteins to manipulate host cell machinery and facilitate bacterial infection. A major challenge in the field has been understanding the interplay between these effectors and host machinery and the consequences this has in mammalian and arthropod environments. Vondrak et al. (e00267-24) discovered that the effector Sca4 interacts with clathrin heavy chain and that this interaction may be important for rickettsial proliferation in the tick cells. Clathrin also facilitates cell-to-cell spread of rickettsiae independent of Sca4 in mammalian cells, highlighting the complexity of host-pathogen interactions in intracellular bacteria.
Source: Infection and Immunity
DOI: 10.1128/iai.00552-24
Language: English
Subfield: Parasitology
Field: Immunology and Microbiology
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W4405242050