School of
LIFE SCIENCES
2017 JUANITA GREER WHITE
DISTINGUISHED LECTURER SERIES
Margaret McFall-Ngai
Professor and Director
Pacific Biosciences Research Center
University of Hawaii at Manoa
Honolulu, Hawaii
Animals and Bacteria: A Lifelong Partnership
Until recently, biologists viewed bacteria
principally as pathogens that negatively affect
human and animal health. New methods have
shown that most animals live their lives with
beneficial
bacteria,
or
mutualistic
symbionts. Such relationships often share a set
of common features: the infant animal recruits
new symbionts from the environment that stay
with the host animal throughout its lifetime.
These new findings beg the questions: (i) how
do animals initially recognize suitable partners,
and (ii) how do they maintain them in
balance? In humans and other vertebrates these
alliances involve thousands of microbial species,
therefore
invertebrates with much simpler
symbiont communities are used to address these
questions. This presentation will describe work
with one such invertebrate, the association
between the Hawaiian bobtail squid and its
bioluminescent bacterial partner. The study of
this association reveals the 'diplomatic relations'
that maintain the stability of a life-long
colonization of animal tissues by beneficial
bacterial symbionts.
Thursday, March 9, 2017 – 6:30 p.m.
Science and Engineering Building Auditorium (SEB 1311)