Fronzes Lab

Research focus

ERC Consolidator Grant · 2016

Structure and Function of the Bacterial Transformasome

Natural genetic transformation, first discovered in Streptococcus pneumoniae by Griffith in 1928, is observed in many Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria. This process promotes genome plasticity and adaptability. In particular, it enables many human pathogens such as Streptococcus pneumoniae, Staphylococcus aureus or Neisseria gonorrhoeae to acquire resistance to antibiotics and/or to escape vaccines. For natural transformation to occur, bacteria must develop a highly regulated physiological state called competence, during which a multiprotein machinery, designated as the transformasome, is specifically expressed. The transformasome drives the uptake of extracellular DNA and its…

From the public funding record at EU CORDIS. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.