title: Assessing Pseudomonas virulence with a nonmammalian host: Drosophila melanogaster.
abstract: Drosophila melanogaster flies represent an interesting model to study host-pathogen interactions as: (1) they are cheap and easy to raise rapidly and do not bring up ethical issues, (2) available genetic tools are highly sophisticated, for instance allowing tissue-specific alteration of gene expression, e.g., of immune genes, (3) they have a relatively complex organization, with distinct digestive tract and body cavity in which local or systemic infections, respectively, take place, (4) a medium throughput can be achieved in genetic screens, for instance looking for Pseudomonas aeruginosa mutants with altered virulence. We present here the techniques used to investigate host-pathogen relationships, namely the two major models of infections as well as the relevant parameters used to monitor the infection (survival, bacterial titer, induction of host immune response).
authors.affiliation: Equipe Fondation Recherche Médicale, UPR 9022 du CNRS, Université de Strasbourg, IBMC, 15, rue René Descartes, 67084, Strasbourg Cedex, France.
authors.forename: Samantha
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Haller
authors.forename: Stefanie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Limmer
authors.forename: Dominique
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Ferrandon
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D023181:Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D001681:Biological Assay / Q000379:methods*; D015169:Colony Count, Microbial; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D004331:Drosophila melanogaster / Q000254:growth & development / Q000382:microbiology*; D006458:Hemolymph / Q000382:microbiology; D054884:Host-Pathogen Interactions; D008322:Mammals; D011552:Pseudomonas Infections / Q000382:microbiology*; D011550:Pseudomonas aeruginosa / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; D014774:Virulence
chemical_list: D023181:Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides