Eric R. Vimr, Pathology, College of Veterinary Medicine, U of I at Illinois

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

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Eric R. Vimr

Professor, Pathobiology

Professional Interests:  Roles of sialic acid metabolism in cellular physiology, bacterial pathogenesis, capsular polysaccharide biosynthesis, sialidase, diagnostic microbiology.

Sialic acids are unique nine-carbon sugars synthesized by all complex metazoan organisms of the Deuterostomia lineage, which includes humans and other "higher" organisms. Neither plants, "lower" metazoans, nor most microbes synthesize sialic acids. A few, usually pathogenic bacterial strains or species synthesize sialic acids for subsequent assembly into extracellular polysaccharides. This phenotype is frequently associated with virulence by allowing the microorganisms to avoid or subvert host immunity. Areas of research include the following:

1) Determine the mechanism of polysialic acid synthesis in the neuroinvasive strain Escherichia coli K1.

2) Sialidase structure and function, including regulation of sialocatabolism in Salmonella typhimurium .

3) Determine the role of sialic acid in the glomerular filtration barrier.

4) Develop Polymerase Chain Reaction for diagnosis of swine respiratory pathogens.

Laboratory of Sialobiology and Comparative Metabolomics

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Selected Publications:

Vimr ER and SM Steenbergen (2006). Targeting microbial sialic acid metabolism for new drug development. In: Protein-carbohydrate interactions in infectious diseases: chemistry and biology (Bewley, C.A. , ed.) Chap. 8, pp. 125-150. Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, UK (in press).

Vimr ER and SM Steenbergen (2006). Mobile contingency locus controlling Escherichia coli K1 polysialic acid capsule acetylation. Mol Microbiol 60: 828-837.

Deszo EL, Steenbergen SM, Freedburg DI and ER Vimr (2005). Escherichia coli K1 polysialic acid O -acetylation transferase gene, neuO,  and the mechanism of capsule form variation involving a mobile contingency locus. Proc Natl Acad Sci 102: 5564-5569

Steenbergen SM, Lichtensteiger CA, Caughlin R, Garfinkle J, Fuller TE and ER Vimr (2005). Infect Immun 73: 1284-1294.

Vimr ER, Kalivoda KA, Deszo EL and SM Steenbergen (2004). Diversity of microbial sialic acid metabolism. Microbiol Mol Biol Rev 68: 132-53.

Ringenberg MA, Steenbergen SM and ER Vimr (2003). The first committed step in the biosynthesis of sialic acid by Escherichia coli K1 does not involve a phosphorylated N-acetyl mannosamine intermediate. Mol Microbiol 50: 961-75.

Kalivoda KA, Steenbergen SM, Vimr ER and J Plumbridge (2003). Regulation of sialic acid catabolism by the DNA binding protein NanR in Escherichia coli. J Bacterial 185: 4806-15.

Lichtensteiger CA and ER Vimr (2003). Purification and renaturation of membrane neuraminidase from Haemophilus parasuis. Vet Microbiol 93: 79-87.

Lichtensteiger CA and ER Vimr (2002). Systemic and enteric colonization of pigs by a hil A signature-tagged mutant of Salmonella choleraesuis. Microb Pathog 34:149-54.

Gonzalez MD, CA Lichtensteiger, R Caughlan and ER Vimr (2002). Conserved filamentous prophage in Escherichia coli 18:K1:H7 and Yersinia pestisi Biovar Orientalis. J Bacteriol 184, 6050-6055.