Course outline:

The course aims to provide students with an understanding and appreciation for the emerging field of cellular microbiology, a fascinating area of how two dynamic systems of host and microbes interact to define health and disease. The course will toggle between zoomed out view of general principles and zoomed in view of specific examples from classical as well as contemporary literature. We will emphasise the specific methodology used in the field, and highlight new and emerging areas and outstanding questions.

Principles of intra-cellular pathogenesis : mechanisms of entry, intra-cellular replication and survival, egress. Vacuolar and cytosolic environments. Challenges faced by intra-cellular pathogens and countering strategies. Specific examples of pathogen driven manipulation of fundamental host processes : cytoskeletal machinery, GTPase cycle, histone acetylation, metabolic processes.

Basics of innate immune responses by host cells : PAMP signals, their recognition and responses. Key innate sensing modules of the cell. Antigen presentation. Innate-adaptive response interface.  Assembly and architecture of NLR resistosomes and inflammasomes. An integrated view of the pattern and effector triggered immunity in plants and the feedback loop.

Virulence determinants : Effector proteins and lipids, bacterial secretory systems, toxins, effector catalogs in filamentous pathogens, translocation mechanisms and the recent advances.

Various Posttranslational modifications (PTMs) and their detection. Role of various PTMs in life-cycle of microbes. Details of the Ubiquitin-like PTM signalling. Examples of the role Ubiquitin-like in host-microbe interaction.

Genome compartmentalization in filamentous pathogens, accessory genomic regions for adaptative evolution.

Drug tolerance and resistance : Key mechanisms of tolerance and resistance. Overview of the problem of AMR.

Emerging concepts : heterogeneity in host-pathogen interactions. Immunometabolism, Zoonosis. Microbiome in the host-microbe interactions.

Key references:

Basic immunology and microbiology text books

Papers provided during the course

Course outcomes:

Understand and appreciate pathogenesis mechanisms and outcomes in different infection systems; emerging concepts in the field of infection biology.

Understand and appreciate the methodologies (classical and contemporary) used for study of infection processes

Learn critical evaluation of classical and current papers in the field