Dr. Paul Dean

Contact information

• Phone number: +44 (0)191 222 3481
• e-mail adress: p.dean (at) newcastle.ac.uk

Work description

During my PhD, I worked on bacterial/fungal pathogens of invertebrates at the University of Bath (UK) with Prof. Keith Charnley and Prof. Stuart Reynolds. This was performed in conjunction with DEFRA in an attempt to identify biological control agents against insect pests. The work involved characterising the insect immune responses to microbial infection and identifying novel virulence factors or toxins that suppressed invertebrate immunity or increased mortality.

My work on pathogens led me to Prof Brendan Kenny's lab in Bristol, where I studied the cell biology of the enteric human pathogen, enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC). This work identified a potent diarrhoeal mechanism induced by EPEC and also defined virulence factors responsible for rapid loss of intestinal microvilli and destruction of tight junctions. After an unsuccessful move to the US, I moved with Brendan to Newcastle where we worked on the interaction between EPEC and the host nucleolus and looked at the involvement of cysteine proteases during EPEC infection. We also identified a number of new host cell signalling pathways that are inhibited during infection by EPEC and Salmonella. Recently, I have been working with the Bioinformatics Support Unit to predict and validate new bacterial virulence factors, which will be published shortly.

At present, I am using my work with bacterial pathogens to investigate and understand the cell biology of the eukaryotic pathogens T. hominis and E. cuniculi.

Paul's publications

• Dean P, Kenny B. A bacterial encoded protein induces extreme multinucleation and cell-cell internalization in intestinal cells. Tissue Barriers. vol 1 (2013).
• Dean P, Young L, Quitard S, Kenny B. Insights into the Pathogenesis of Enteropathogenic E. coli Using an Improved Intestinal Enterocyte. PLos One. vol 8 (2013). pubmed
• Bulmer DM, Kharraz L, Grant AJ, Dean P, Morgan FJ, Karavolos MH, Doble AC, McGhie EJ, Koronakis V, Daniel RA, Mastroeni P, Khan CM. The bacterial cytoskeleton modulates motility, type 3 secretion, and colonization in Salmonella. PLoS Pathog. vol 8 p. doi:10.1371/ (2012). pubmed
• Dean P. Functional domains and motifs of bacterial type three effector proteins and their roles in infection. FEMS Microbiology Reviews. epub (2011). pubmed
• Dean P, Kenny B. Cell-surface nucleolin is sequestered into EPEC microcolonies and may play a role during infection. Microbiology. vol 157 p. 1761-7 (2011). pubmed
• Ruchaud-Sparagano M-H , Muhlen S , Dean P , Kenny B. The Enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC) Tir Effector Inhibits NF-?B Activity by Targeting TNF? Receptor-Associated Factors. PLoS Pathog. vol 7 p. doi:10.1371/ (2011). pubmed
• Dean P, Muehlen S, Quitard S, Kenny B. The bacterial effectors EspG and EspG2 induce a destructive calpain activity that is kept in check by the co-delivered Tir effector. Cell Microbiol. vol 12 p. 1308-21 (2010). pubmed
• Dean P, Scott JA, Knox AA, Quitard S, Watkins NJ, Kenny B. The enteropathogenic E. coli effector EspF targets and disrupts the nucleolus by a process regulated by mitochondrial dysfunction. PLoS Pathog. vol 24 p. e1000961 (2010). pubmed
• Holmes A, Muehlen S, Roe AJ, Dean P. The EspF effector, a bacterial pathogen's Swiss army knife. Infect Immun. vol 78 p. 4445-53 (2010). pubmed
• Dean P, Kenny B. The effector repertoire of enteropathogenic E. coli: ganging up on the host cell. Curr Opin Microbiol. vol 12 p. 101-9 (2009). pubmed
• Iguchi A, Thomson NR, Ogura Y, Saunders D, Ooka T, Henderson IR, Harris D, Asadulghani M, Kurokawa K, Dean P, Kenny B, Quail MA, Thurston S, Dougan G, Hayashi T, Parkhill J, Frankel G. Complete genome sequence and comparative genome analysis of enteropathogenic Escherichia coli O127:H6 strain E2348/69. J Bacteriol. vol 191 p. 347-54 (2009). pubmed
• Dean P, Maresca M, Schueller S, Phillips AD, Kenny B. Potent diarrheagenic mechanism mediated by the cooperative action of three enteropathogenic Escherichia coli-injected effector proteins. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. vol 103 p. 1876-81 (2006). pubmed
• Quitard S, Dean P, Maresca M, Kenny B. The enteropathogenic Escherichia coli EspF effector molecule inhibits PI-3 kinase-mediated uptake independently of mitochondrial targeting. Cell Microbiol. vol 8 p. 972-81 (2006). pubmed
• Dean P, Maresca M, Kenny B. EPEC's weapons of mass subversion. Curr Opin Microbiol. vol 8 p. 28-34 (2005). pubmed
• Maresca M, Miller D, Quitard S, Dean P, Kenny B. Enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) effector-mediated suppression of antimicrobial nitric oxide production in a small intestinal epithelial model system. Cell Microbiol. vol 7 p. 1749-62 (2005). pubmed
• Au C, Dean P, Reynolds SE, ffrench-Constant RH. Effect of the insect pathogenic bacterium Photorhabdus on insect phagocytes. Cell Microbiol. vol 6 p. 89-95 (2004). pubmed
• Dean P, Kenny B. Intestinal barrier dysfunction by enteropathogenic Escherichia coli is mediated by two effector molecules and a bacterial surface protein. Mol Microbiol. vol 54 p. 665-75 (2004). pubmed
• Dean P, Potter U, Richards EH, Edwards JP, Charnley AK, Reynolds SE. Hyperphagocytic haemocytes in Manduca sexta. J Insect Physiol. vol 50 p. 1027-36 (2004). pubmed
• Dean P, Richards EH, Edwards JP, Reynolds SE, Charnley K. Microbial infection causes the appearance of hemocytes with extreme spreading ability in monolayers of the tobacco hornworm Manduca sexta. Dev Comp Immunol. vol 28 p. 689-700 (2004). pubmed
• Bundey S, Raymond S, Dean P, Roberts SK, Dillon RJ, Charnley AK. Eicosanoid involvement in the regulation of behavioral fever in the desert locust, Schistocerca gregaria. Arch Insect Biochem Physiol. vol 52 p. 183-92 (2003). pubmed
• Dean P. Cell of the month: An insect blood cell engulfing bacteria. Nat Cell Biol. vol 5 p. 957 (2003). pubmed
• Dean P, Gadsden JC, Richards EH, Edwards JP, Keith Charnley A, Reynolds SE. Modulation by eicosanoid biosynthesis inhibitors of immune responses by the insect Manduca sexta to the pathogenic fungus Metarhizium anisopliae. J Invertebr Pathol. vol 79 p. 93-101 (2002). pubmed
• Silva CP, Waterfield NR, Daborn PJ, Dean P, Chilver T, Au CP, Sharma S, Potter U, Reynolds SE, ffrench-Constant RH. Bacterial infection of a model insect: Photorhabdus luminescens and Manduca sexta. Cell Microbiol. vol 4 p. 329-39 (2002). pubmed
• Xia Y, Dean P, Judge AJ, Gillespie JP, Clarkson JM, Charnley AK. Acid phosphatases in the haemolymph of the desert locust, Schistocerca gregaria, infected with the entomopathogenic fungus Metarhizium anisopliae. J Insect Physiol. vol 46 p. 1249-1257 (2000). pubmed