Multitask learning for host–pathogen protein interactions

Kshirsagar, Meghana; Carbonell, Jaime; Klein-Seetharaman, Judith

Some recent work on infectious diseases has alluded to the hypothesis that different pathogens target essentially the same critical biological processes in the human body. The analysis by Chen et al. (2012) suggests that HIV infection shares common molecular mechanisms with certain signaling pathways and cancers. Dyer et al. (2008) study bacterial and viral interactions with human genes and find infection mechanisms common to multiple pathogens. Experiments by Jubelin et al. (2010) show how various bacterial cyclomodulins target the host cell cycle. The study by Mukhtar et al. (2011) on plant pathogens, in particular, Arabidopsis concludes that pathogens from different kingdoms deploy independently evolved virulence proteins that interact with a limited set of highly connected cellular hubs to facilitate their diverse life cycle strategies. Figure 1B illustrates an example depicting the commonality in various bacterial species, where they are targeting the same biological pathways in their human host.