The human microbiome is a dynamic ecosystem with high influxes of organisms from the surrounding environment, especially the soil. Upon leaving the human body, these organisms enter the soil and persist through some unknown mechanism, and eventually return to the human body, sometimes as pathogenic organisms. This project uses Burkholderia, a genus with members that are pathogens of animals, plants, and perhaps fungi, to serve as a model system, with the specific goal of defining the basic interactions of symbiotic establishment between Burkholderia isolates and their fungal hosts. This project will provide a mechanistic understanding of interactions between these organisms and discover new insights into how human-associated bacteria persist in the soil:
Aim 1 will make direct associations among soil fungi and Burkholderia species and compare the genomic patterns that connect animal, plant, and fungal associated species. The results will allow us to understand and monitor new genetic potentials from environmental strains will allow us to make better predictions of the negative impacts that pathogenic microbes have when they return to interact with humans.
Aim 2 will identify the molecular mechanism of interactions mediated by fungal exometabolic products. The results will allow make direct connections between fungi as potential alternative hosts that maintain human-associated microbes in the soil.
And Aim 3 will test competitive interactions between Burkholderia and other members of the fungal microbiome. By applying ecological theory to fungal-bacterial interactions, we will be able to make inferences into how certain microbes persist in the soil that may translate to other environment such as the human microbiome. Together the results of this project will elucidate poorly understood mechanisms of fungal-bacterial interactions, and assist with the potential development of novel techniques and theoretical concepts that may aid in predicting, preventing, and curing Burkholderia infections.
