Publications by authors named "Melissa Su-Juan Chee"
Lateral transduction (LT) is the process by which temperate phages mobilize large sections of bacterial genomes. Despite its importance, LT has only been observed during prophage induction. Here, we report that superantigen-carrying staphylococcal pathogenicity islands (SaPIs) employ a related but more versatile and complex mechanism of gene transfer to drive chromosomal hypermobility while self-transferring with additional virulence genes from the host.
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- * Blastocystis, a single-cell parasite, has sparked debate on its role—whether beneficial or harmful—within the gut microbiome.
- * This study investigates the unique function of the Blastocystis tryptophanase gene (BhTnaA), showing that it converts indole to tryptophan rather than the reverse, indicating a possible role in tryptophan production in the gut.
Genetic transduction is a major evolutionary force that underlies bacterial adaptation. Here we report that the temperate bacteriophages of engage in a distinct form of transduction we term lateral transduction. Staphylococcal prophages do not follow the previously described excision-replication-packaging pathway but instead excise late in their lytic program.
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