Johanna Elfenbein
University of Wisconsin-Madison, WI·Microbiology & Immunology
Non-typhoidal Salmonella is a leading cause of bacterial food poisoning and causes the most deaths of any foodborne pathogen in the United States. During infection, the body sends in neutrophils, immune cells that kill microbes with toxic chemicals.
- Fields
Microbiology & Immunology
Biochemistry
- Topics
Salmonella
foodborne illness
gastroenteritis
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jan 2028
What they work on
- Test whether the membrane protein gene yeiH is needed for Salmonella Typhimurium to survive during infection, using animal models of colitis and sepsis.
- Map where sulfite stress occurs during gut and systemic salmonellosis, using a yeiH transcriptional reporter as a sulfite biosensor in infected tissues.
- Determine whether YeiH exports sulfite out of the bacterial cell and whether the proton motive force, the cell's membrane energy, drives its function.
- Identify the amino acid residues in YeiH that are important for Salmonella's resistance to sulfite stress.
More about the research
One of these chemicals is sulfite, a reactive sulfur compound that is toxic to all life. Sulfites are also made during normal metabolism of sulfur-containing amino acids and are added to food as preservatives. Gut pathogens therefore must survive sulfite at several stages of infection, but how they do so is poorly understood.
Why it matters
Salmonella food poisoning is a major cause of foodborne illness and death. YeiH-like proteins exist in many bacterial pathogens that matter for human health. Understanding how bacteria resist immune-produced sulfite could therefore point to new ways to treat bacterial infections. It could also clarify how sulfites in the body and in food affect resistance to infection.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Leigh Knodler
University of Vermont, VT·Microbiology & Immunology
Determine whether nine genes in the 40-kilobase type III secretion gene cluster on the Providencia alcalifaciens plasmid drive invasion of host cells, combining computational prediction, in vitro biochemistry and infection of cultured non-phagocytic cells.
Gustavo Caballero Flores
University of Wisconsin-Madison, WI·Microbiology & Immunology·Early-career
Identify bacterial factors that Citrobacter rodentium needs to establish bacteremia, bloodstream infection, in newborn mice, using genome-wide mutant screens followed by functional testing of candidates in live animals.
Jorge E Galan
Yale University, CT·Microbiology & Immunology
Determine how short N-terminal secretion signals and dedicated chaperones direct client proteins to the type III secretion injectisome, the syringe-like machine Salmonella uses to inject proteins into host cells.
The school
University of Wisconsin-Madison: 91 labs on PI Pages, $1.9B a year on research, 854 research doctorates a year.
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