Streptococcus pneumoniae encounters a number of environmental niches in the body, including the nasopharynx, lungs, blood, middle ear, and brain. Recent studies have identified 13 putative two-component signal-transduction systems in S. pneumoniae, which are likely to be important for gene regulation in response to external stimuli. Here, we present conclusive evidence for the regulation of cho...

Neutrophils are key effector cells of the innate immune response to pathogenic bacteria, but excessive neutrophilic inflammation can be associated with bystander tissue damage. The mechanisms responsible for neutrophil recruitment to the lungs during bacterial pneumonia are poorly defined. In this study, we focus on the potential role of the major high-affinity thrombin receptor, proteinase-act...

The need for the development of cheap and effective vaccines against pneumococcal disease has necessitated the evaluation of common virulence-associated proteins of Streptococcus pneumoniae as potential vaccine antigens. In this study, we examined the capacity of active immunization with a genetic toxoid derivative of pneumolysin (PdB) and/or a fragment of choline binding protein A (CbpA; also ...

Dragline silk is the most prominent amongst spider silks and comprises two types of major ampullate spidroins (MaSp) differing in their proline content. In the natural spinning process, the conversion of soluble MaSp into a tough fiber is, amongst other factors, triggered by dimerization and conformational switching of their helical amino-terminal domains (NRN). Both processes are induced by pr...

The economic reality of the 1990s in Europe forced the labour markets to become more flexible. Using a consistent comparative dataset for 14 European countries, the European Community Household Panel (ECHP), we explore the evolution and the cross-national differences in earnings mobility across Europe between 1994 and 2001 from three angles: first, the evolution of short-term inequality and its...

Despite being an exclusive human pathogen, Streptococcus pneumoniae (the pneumococcus) is highly adaptable to the various host niches it encounters. It is foremost an exceptional colonizer of the human nasopharynx, where it has developed an array of strategies to adjust to both host factors and other microbial flora that reside there. Upon changes in this environment, often associated with viru...

Hearing loss remains the most common long-term complication of pneumococcal meningitis (PM) reported in up to 30% of survivors. Streptococcus pneumoniae have been shown to possess different ototoxic properties. Here we present a novel ex vivo experimental setup to examine in detail the pattern of hair cell loss upon exposure to different S. pneumoniae strains, therefore recapitulating pathogen ...

Iron-Sulfur (Fe-S) proteins are involved in many biological functions such as electron transport, photosynthesis, regulation of gene expression and enzymatic activities. Biosynthesis and transfer of Fe-S clusters depend on Fe-S clusters assembly processes such as ISC, SUF, NIF, and CIA systems. Unlike other eukaryotes which possess ISC and CIA systems, amitochondriate Entamoeba histolytica has ...