Jennifer Tran

Current Research

Identifying new players in the Acinetobacter baumannii cell envelope

Acinetobacter baumannii (Ab), a Gram-negative opportunistic pathogen, is considered an urgent threat to public health as some strains have gained resistance to all known antibiotics. The Ab cell envelope is vital to bacterial growth and survival and plays an important role in drug resistance. In particular, Ab can gain resistance to colistin, a last-resort antibiotic, by inactivating synthesis of lipooligosaccharide (LOS), the outer leaflet component of the outer membrane. Using high-throughput, systematic approaches, I will identify genes involved in pathways linked to LOS inactivation (i.e. class A PBPs and the BaeSR regulatory system) as well as screen for novel envelope-related genes and chemical-gene interactions.