The bacterium changes its genome, mimics immune molecules

in january 2009, there was an outbreak of meningococcal meningitis in Meghalaya and Tripura. Two thousand people were infected, 250 died. Over the past years, this disease has afflicted the world several times and with varying intensities. Helena Lo and other researchers, at the department of microbiology from the Imperial College in London, UK, got together to investigate what makes the meningitis bacterium life-threatening.

The meningitis is caused by the bacterium Neisseria meningitidis. It has evolved such that it only requires the body of one host to complete its life cycle: the human body. Such adaptabi