Publications by authors named "B Casu"

We here describe the structure-based design of small molecule inhibitors of the type IV secretion system of . The secretion system is encoded by the  pathogenicity island, and we chose Cagα, a hexameric ATPase and member of the family of VirB11-like proteins, as target for inhibitor design. We first solved the crystal structure of Cagα in a complex with the previously identified small molecule inhibitor 1G2.

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The acquisition of multidrug resistance (MDR) determinants jeopardizes treatment of bacterial infections with antibiotics. The tripartite efflux pump AcrAB-NodT confers adaptive MDR in the polarized α-proteobacterium Caulobacter crescentus via transcriptional induction by first-generation quinolone antibiotics. We discovered that overexpression of AcrAB-NodT by mutation or exogenous inducers confers resistance to cephalosporin and penicillin (β-lactam) antibiotics.

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Background And Aims: A comparison of the amino acid (AA) plasma profile and markers of intestinal absorption-inflammation between healthy subjects aged 65-70 years and age-matched patients affected by stage 3b-4 chronic kidney disease (CKD3b-4) was performed.

Methods: Eleven healthy volunteers were compared with 12 CKD3b-4 patients at their first outpatient control (T0) and after 12-months (T12). Adherence to a low protein diet (LPD, 0.

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Contractile injection systems (CIS) are bacteriophage tail-like structures that mediate bacterial cell-cell interactions. While CIS are highly abundant across diverse bacterial phyla, representative gene clusters in Gram-positive organisms remain poorly studied. Here we characterize a CIS in the Gram-positive multicellular model organism Streptomyces coelicolor and show that, in contrast to most other CIS, S.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study investigates how the composition of stool bacteria in kidney cancer patients affects the effectiveness of immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) therapy, specifically nivolumab, which has been shown to improve treatment outcomes in renal cell carcinoma (RCC).
  • Researchers collected fecal samples from 69 advanced RCC patients and analyzed these alongside samples from healthy volunteers to find correlations between gut bacteria and treatment responses, while also examining the impact of antibiotics and tyrosine kinase inhibitors on microbiota.
  • The findings suggest that recent antibiotic use significantly reduces response rates to ICB therapy, emphasizing the importance of gut bacteria in predicting patient outcomes and highlighting a potential area for improving cancer treatment strategies.
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