Surfing Through a Sea of Sharks: Report on the British Society for Cell Biology Meeting on 'Signaling and Cytoskeletal Dynamics During Infection', October 2-5, 2005, Edinburgh, Scotland

摘要

In early 1996, Pascale Cossart and colleagues wrote a short landmark paper in Science summarizing the thoughts of many researchers to announce the opening of a new field of research at the crossroads of 'pure' cell biology and the studies of pathogens: cellular microbiology. Pathogens, having coevolved with their respective hosts, so they argued, must be masters of cell biology. Thus, by studying how pathogens usurp or modify cellular functions to their own advantage we should gain insights into the basic workings of the cell and the biology of pathogens alike. There was also a glimmer of hope that these studies might provide us with rational ways to design drugs or vaccines against disease agents that kill millions of people year after year. Almost 10 years later Michael Way convened a meeting under the auspices of the British Society for Cell Biology to take stock of where part of the field was standing. The meeting, entitled 'Signaling and cytoskeletal dynamics during infection', made clear how much these parts of the field have advanced and how bright a future lays ahead.