%0 Generic
%9 Master's Thesis
%A Weist, Genevieve
%D 2019
%F pittir:37398
%K Biofilm; biosensors;
%T Designing Biosensors to Detect the Activity of   Signaling Pathways during Host-Microbe Interactions
%U http://d-scholarship-dev.library.pitt.edu/37398/
%X During chronic infections, pathogenic microbes colonize host environments by forming biofilms, a process that is orchestrated by signaling systems. These signaling systems, sensitive to both host and co-habitating bacteria, help to recruit individual microbes to the biofilm, selectively target and kill invasive microbes, and promote biofilm dispersal.1 Formation of bacterial biofilms in cystic fibrosis patients by Pseudomonas aeruginosa microbes triggers the transition from acute to chronic infection in compromised airways. Unfortunately, due to lack of direct methods to detect signaling activity in living cells, signals within signaling systems have been difficult to identify in P. aeruginosa. We propose the development of strategies to track the activity of bacterial signaling proteins to elucidate mechanisms of host-microbe interactions.    We aim to develop tools to determine the signals utilized in biofilm formation, visibly and instantaneously. To do so, we utilize dimerization dependent green fluorescent proteins (ddGFPs),2 circular permuted green fluorescent protein (cpGFP),3 and a fluorescent protein gene reporter as outputs  of the two-component signaling system from P. aeruginosa. These biosensors will allow us to track the downstream activation of signaling systems and the corresponding biofilm formation in living cells.