We’re very excited to share the first paper from the lab “Host glutathione is required for Rickettsia parkeri to properly septate, avoid ubiquitylation, and survive in macrophages” now available online as a preprint on BioRxiv! https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.10.02.560592v1

This project has been spearheaded by our technician Michelle Sun, congratulations Michelle! The title pretty much says it all, but what it doesn’t convey are the very cool super-resolution images showing how glutathione depletion causes Rickettsia to chain. We propose the idea that reducing environments are host-associated molecular patterns (HAMPs), sensed by cytosolic bacteria as a cue to initiate virulence.