It has been shown previously in our lab that mutations in the pyrimidine pathway reduced the ability of Pseudomonas aeruginosa to produce virulence factors. Knockout mutations in pyrB, pyrC and pyrD genes of the pyrimidine pathway showed that virulence factor production was decreased. Pyoverdin, pyocyanin, hemolysin, iron chelation, motility, and adherence are all considered virulence factors. Here I further investigate the effects of mutations in the pyrimidine pathway by studying a pyrE mutant. I studied the effect of the pyrE mutation on the production of the above virulence factors. Just like the effect of pyrB, pyrC and pyrD mutations,the pyrE mutation also showed that the bacteria were deficient in producing virulence factors when compared to the wild type. The broader impact of this research would be the possibility of finding drugs that could treat patients infected with P. aeruginosa and possibly extend the lives of chronically infected patients with cystic fibrosis.

It has been shown previously in our laboratory that zebrafish produce trypsin from their gills when they are under stress, and this trypsin is involved in thrombocyte activation via PAR2 during gill bleeding. In this study, I investigated another role of the trypsin that is secreted from zebrafish. This investigation has demonstrated a novel role of trypsin in zebrafish. Not only did this investigation demonstrate the role of trypsin in zebrafish behavior, but also it showed that PAR2 might be the receptor that is involved in trypsin-mediated behavioral response. In addition, we have shown that Gq and ERK inhibitors are able to block the trypsin pathway and prevent the escaping behavior. Finally, the results of this investigation suggest that the cells that respond to trypsin are surface cells, which have an appearance similar to that of neuromast cells.