Seveau, Stéphanie

Stéphanie Seveau, PhD, is an Assistant Professor primarily appointed in the Department of Microbiology and jointly appointed in the Department of Internal Medicine. Dr. Seveau joined the faculty in 2006.

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. 

Dr. Seveau’s laboratory is interested in studying how Listeria monocytogenes invades 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 additional 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.

Dr. Seveau's research is also focused on determining 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 bacterial infection.

Recent Publications

Seveau S., Tham T.N., Payrastre B., Hoppe A.D., Swanson J.A., and Cossart P.  A FRET analysis to unravel the role of cholesterol in  Rac1 and PI 3-kinase activation in the InlB/Met signalling pathway. Cell Microbiol. 2007. 9:790-803.

M. Hamon, E. Batsche, C. Muchardt, TT Nam, S. Seveau and P. Cossart. Histone modifications induced by a family of bacterial toxins. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2007 Aug 14;104(33):13467-72

Seveau S., Pizarro-Cerda J., Cossart P. Molecular mechanisms exploited by Listeria monocytogenes during host cell invasion. Microbes Infect. 2007 Aug;9(10):1167-75

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.

Contact

seveau.1@osu.edu

phone: 614-247-7671

Room 541, Biological Sciences Building

484 West 12^th Avenue

Columbus, OH 43210-1292