An adaptable soft-mold embossing process for fabricating optically-accessible, microfeature-based culture systems and application toward liver stage antimalarial compound testing.

Advanced cell culture methods for modeling organ-level structure have been demonstrated to replicate in vivo conditions more accurately than traditional in vitro cell culture. Given that the liver is particularly important to human health, several advanced culture methods have been developed to experiment with liver disease states, including infection with Plasmodium parasites, the causative agent of malaria. These models have demonstrated that intrahepatic parasites require functionally stable hepatocytes to thrive and robust characterization of the parasite populations' response to investigational therapies is dependent on high-content and high-resolution imaging (HC/RI).

Reassessing the role of DotF in the Legionella pneumophila type IV secretion system.

Legionella pneumophila, the causative agent of a severe pneumonia termed Legionnaires' Disease, survives and replicates within both protozoan hosts and human alveolar macrophages. Intracellular survival is dependent upon secretion of a plethora of protein effectors that function to form a replicative vacuole, evade the endocytic pathway and subvert host immune defenses. Export of these factors requires a type IV secretion system (T4SS) called Dot/Icm that is composed of twenty-seven proteins.