Bacterial genomes and infectious diseases

Abstract

The emergence and reemergence of infectious diseases, an increasing rate of antibiotic-resistant variants of pathogens, and the threat of bioterrorism underscore the importance of bacterial genomes and infectious diseases. Bacterial Genomes and Infectious Diseases presents major findings about bacterial genomes and their impact on strategy and approach for investigating mechanisms of pathogenesis of infectious diseases. This book imparts fundamental knowledge on the structure, organization, and evolution of bacterial genomes. The value and power of comparative genomics and proteomics, bioinformatics, microarrays, and knockout animal models in analyzing genomes, bacteria-host interactions and disease are demonstrated. Also discussed are the genomes of virulent and nonvirulent strains and species, origin and evolution of pathogens, different models of bacteria-host interactions, and diseases mechanisms. © 2006 Humana Press Inc. All rights reserved.