Campus Directory

Division: Physical & Biological Sciences

Department/College/Unit: Microbiology & Environmental Toxicology

Other UCSC Campus Affiliation:

• Molecular, Cell, & Developmental Biology
• Biomolecular Science & Engineering

Title:

• Professor
• Chair

Faculty Type: Regular Faculty

Web Site: Professor Ottemann's Research

Office Location: Physical Sciences Building 454

Mail Stop: METX

Campus Address: 1156 High Street
Santa Curz CA 95064

Biography, Education, and Training: • B.S, University of California, Davis (Bacteriology)
• Ph.D. in Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, Harvard University (with John Mekalanos)
• Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, Berkeley in Biochemistry (with Daniel E. Koshland, Jr.)

Areas of Expertise: Infection by the ulcer-causing bacterium Helicobacter pylori
Bacterial chemotaxis

Research Interests: How pathogenic bacteria such as Helicobacter pylori use environmental cues to establish infection.

For pathogenic bacteria to set up an infection, they must know that they have arrived at the proper location. Karen Ottemann's laboratory investigates how bacteria translate chemical and physical cues in their host environment into an advantageous response.

Ottemann lab members are particularly interested in how pathogens use swimming during infection, using the bacterium Helicobacter pylori as a model for this ability. This pathogen infects some 3 billion people and can lead to serious disease, including ulcers and cancer. Bacteria do not swim at random, but instead direct their motility (chemotaxis) by the activity of sensing proteins called chemoreceptors. The chemotaxis system thus allows us to examine the types of cues sensed by pathogens.

Teaching Interests: Bacteriology
Molecular microbiology

Selected Publications:

• Draper, J., K. Karplus, K. M. Ottemann. CZB: A Zinc-binding domain common to cytoplasmic bacterial chemoreceptors. In press in Journal of Bacteriology, 2011.
• Alexander, R. P., A. C. Lowenthal, R. M. Harshey and K. M. Ottemann. 2010. CheV: CheW-like coupling proteins at the core of the chemotaxis signaling network. Trends in Microbiology 18:494-503
• Radar, B. A., C. Wreden, K. G. Hicks, E. Goers Sweeney, K. M. Ottemann, K. Guillemin..2011. Helicobacter pylori perceives the quorum-sensing molecule AI-2 as a chemorepellant via the chemoreceptor TlpB. Microbiology 2011 May 20.
• Lertsethtakarn, P. and K. M. Ottemann. 2010. A remote CheZ ortholog retains phosphatase function. Molecular Microbiology, 77:225-35.
• Li, J., A. C. Go, M. J. Ward and K. M. Ottemann. 2010. The chemical-in-plug bacterial chemotaxis assay is prone to false positives. BMC Research Notes 3:77.
• Williams, S. M., Y.-T. Chen, T. M. Andermann, J. E. Carter, D. J. McGee, and K. M. Ottemann. 2007. Helicobacter pylori chemotaxis modulates inflammation and bacterium-gastric epithelium interactions in infected mice. Infection and Immunity 75: 3747-3757
• Lowenthal, A. C., M. Hill, L. K. Sycuro, K. Mehmood, N. R. Salama, K. M. Ottemann. 2009. Functional Analysis of the Helicobacter pylori Flagellar Switch Proteins. Journal of Bacteriology 191:7147-7156.
• Lowenthal, A. C., C. Simon, A. S. Fair, K. Mehmood, K. Terry, S. Anastasia and K. M. Ottemann. 2009. A fixed-time diffusion analysis method determines that the three cheV genes of Helicobacter pylori differentially affect motility. Microbiology 155: 1181-1191.
• Castillo, A. R., A. J. Woodruff, L. E. Connolly, W. E. Sause and K. M. Ottemann. 2008 Recombination-based In Vivo Expression Technology identifies Helicobacter genes important for host colonization. Infection and Immunity, 76: 5632-5644.

Advisees, Grad Students, & Researchers:

Courses:

• BIOL/METX 119: Microbiology
• BIOL/METX 119L Microbiology Lab
• METX 200: Interdisciplinary Approaches in Environmental Toxicology
• METX 206A: Advanced Microbiology