PhD defence

From stress to success; How actinobacteria exploit live without a cell wall

• V.M.A. Ongenae

Date

Tuesday 11 March 2025

Time

14:30 - 15:30 hour

Address

Academy Building
Rapenburg 73
2311 GJ Leiden

Supervisor(s)

• Prof.dr. D. Claessen
• Prof.dr. A. Briegel

Summary

Bacteriophages, or phages in short, are the most abundant biological entities on this planet and pose a major threat to bacteria. Since many bacteria are evolving resistance to known antibiotics, phage therapy could be a great alternative to treat pathogetnic bacteria. Phages recognize the bacterial host by attaching to structures located on the cell wall and subsequently infect and kill the bacterium. In order to counteract phage attack, bacteria have evolved multiple highly specific escape mechanisms, such as restriction-modification, abortive infection, or CRISPR/Cas systems, among many others. However, these strategies are permanent and often effective only against specific phages. In this research, we discovered a robust response that occurs when diverse phages infect bacterial hosts in osmoprotective environments. We show that upon phage exposure, the bacteria transiently shed their cell wall, leading to the formation of viable cell wall-deficient cells that increase survival of the bacterial population. This discovery might play a big role during phage infection and should be considered during phage therapy research.

PhD dissertations

Approximately one week after the defence, PhD dissertations by Leiden PhD students are available digitally through the Leiden Repository, that offers free access to these PhD dissertations. Please note that in some cases a dissertation may be under embargo temporarily and access to its full-text version will only be granted later.

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