PhD Mid-term Seminar Series: Nanomechanics of Microbial and viral Infections: Towards Mechanopharmacology

CIC nanoGUNE Seminars

Speaker
Antonio Reifs, Nanobiomechanics Group
When
2019/10/28
12:00
Place
nanoGUNE seminar room, Tolosa Hiribidea 76, Donostia - San Sebastian
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PhD Mid-term Seminar Series: Nanomechanics of Microbial and viral Infections: Towards Mechanopharmacology Microbial infections are one of the leading cause of death worldwide. Bacteria causing diseases such as pneumonia, tuberculosis and cholera meanwhile virus like HIV cause a cronic or mortal disease. Moreover, emerging antibiotic resistant bacteria strains have been isolated, being the cause of thousands of deaths every year. It is a global concern to develop novel treatments against this microorganisms. In this context, mechanomedicine is an emerging field, which studies how mechanical forces affects the structure and properties of cells and proteins such as membrane receptors and how this is related to diseases. In this research we study some different infection mechanisms at a mechanical level, from bacteria, such as escherichia coli or yersinia pestis and other from virus, HIV. We studied the mechanical arquitecture of these systems by looking at the most relevant points and interactions, we performed high-throughput virtual screening and docking to find compounds that have the capability to interact with mechanically relevant parts of the system and disturb the native interaction in order to prevent the infection. Following this methodology, we have found three different mechanomodulators for HIV-1 receptor CD4 and design an assay for single-bacterium adhesion measurements. We continue our research studying virulence factors from staphylococcus aureus responsible of endocarditis infection, we will receive different strains form patients allowing us to study if exist any correlation between the mechanical of those factors and the virulence degree observed in the patient.