Coxiella burnetii: Living inside the host cell

Abstract

Coxiella burnetii is an obligate intracellular pathogen, causal agent of Q fever. In this brief review, we describe how recent described mechanisms help our understanding of C. burnetii invasion and his survival in the host cell by the formation of a replicative niche: the Coxiella-containing vacuole. We describe the actin-associated proteins involved in the internalization of C. burnetii, and we discuss the contribution of diverse degradative pathway of the cell during the formation and stabilization of the Coxiella-containing vacuole.