Stéphanie Seveau, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor

Departments of Microbiology & Internal Medicine

Center for Microbial Interface Biology

seveau.1@osu.edu

Room 541, Biological Sciences Building

Ohio State University

484 West 12 th Avenue

Columbus , OH 43210-1292

Tel: (614) 247-7671

Fax: (614) 292-8120

Education

1997 Ph.D., Pierre and Marie Curie University, Paris, France

1998-2001 Postdoctoral Training, Department of Biochemistry, Weill Medical College of Cornell University, NewYork, USA

2001-2005 Research Investigator, Department of Cell Biology and Infection, Pasteur Institute, Paris , France

2005-2006 Research Investigator, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA

RESEARCH INTERESTS

Dr. Seveau’s research is focused on understanding, at the molecular level, host-pathogen interactions and the innate immune responses to infection. The results of her research provide a molecular basis for the logical design of new anti-microbial therapeutics. Specific projects currently are to:

1. Establish how Listeria monocytogenes invades and establishes infections of mammalian cells and tissues. L. monocytogenes is a food-borne intracellular bacterial pathogen that causes gastroenteritis, meningitis, encephalitis and fetal infections of humans. L. monocytogenes lives inside host cells, and its ability to invade mammalian cells facilitates both its initial transit through the epithelial barrier of the digestive tract, and subsequent colonization of many internal organs. State-of-the-art quantitative fluorescence microscopy is used as the primary approach to investigate and quantify L. monocytogenes infections of live host cells. The complex dynamics of the signaling events that lead to L. monocytogenes uptake by epithelial cells and macrophages are being determined and characterized.

2. Determine the molecular basis, and outcome of host-cell signaling induced by cholesterol-dependent cytolysin (CDCs) toxins. CDCs are a family of closely-related pore-forming bacterial toxins produced by many Gram-positive Listeria, Streptococcus, Bacillus and Clostridium species. At concentrations below those that cause host-cell lysis, these virulence factors function as signaling molecules but the underlying molecular biology and the host cell responses to this toxin-signaling remain unknown. To gain this information, we are investigating the signaling properties of listeriolysin O, a CDC and the major virulence factor of L. monocytogenes. Structure-function dissection of listeriolysin O is being combined with live-cell imaging to establish how this toxin affects host-cell signaling during the course of a bacterial infection.

Recent publications

Seveau, S., Tham, T.N., Payrastre, B., Hoppe, A., Swanson, J.A., and Cossart, P. 2006.

Spatial distribution of PI (3,4) P 2 and PI (3,4,5) P 3 phosphoinositides is crucial for Rac1 activation in Met signaling pathway. Cell. Microbiol. Manuscript In Press.

Martinez , J.J., Seveau, S., Veiga-Chacon, E., Matsuyama , S., and Cossart, P. 2005. Ku70, a component of DNA-dependent protein kinase, is a receptor involved in Rickettsia conorii invasion of mammalian cells. Cell 123 (6):1013-1023

Seveau, S., Bierne, H., Giroux, S., Prevost, M.C., and Cossart, P. 2004. Role of lipid rafts in E-cadherin- and HGF-R/Met-mediated entry of Listeria monocytogenes into host cells. J. Cell Biol. 166:743-753.