Bacteria Free Themselves with Molecular ‘Speargun’

Many bacteria are armed with nano-spearguns, which they use to combat unwelcome competitors or knockout host cells. The pathogen responsible for tularemia, a highly virulent infectious disease, uses this weapon to escape from its prison in cells defending the host. Researchers from the Biozentrum of the University of Basel report on this bacterial strategy in the current issue of 'Nature Communications'. Tularemia is an infectious disease that mostly affects rabbits and rodents, but also humans can become infected. The cause of this serious disease is the bacterium Francisella tularensis. The infection biologists led by Prof. Marek Basler and Prof. Petr Broz, from the Biozentrum of the University of Basel, demonstrate on a Francisella subspecies which is harmless to man, how these bacteria escape from digestive vesicles in defense cells using a nano-speargun. Tularemia: a serious infectious disease.