Membrane Trafficking and Signaling in Bacteria

The MTSB group aims at depicting the mechanisms by which bacteria adapt their response to a changing environment, at the molecular level, with an important emphasis on membrane processes (secretion, efflux/import, envelope preservation). Indeed, membranes are of central importance in the bacterial exchanges, but also with chemical sensing of the environment and communication with the biological partners of the bacterium; they facilitate nutrient uptake and efflux of toxic compounds, they provide specific systems for the secretion of toxins or enzymes involved in pathogenic interactions, they support the molecules and transduction machineries for informing the cell of its proximal liquid or solid environment. Our scientific objectives are to reinforce the knowledge of such processes along the 2 following axes:

• Axis 1: Virulence factors and mechanisms
• Axis 2: Envelope trafficking and signaling