<p>This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.</p> <p><italic>Listeria monocytogenes</italic> is a remarkably successful food-borne pathogen. It is capable a) of
surviving and proliferating under conditions that exist within the food chain, such as at low
temperatures, high salt and low pH and b) of colonizing animal host tissues after ingestion
of contaminated food, causing opportunistic infections mainly, but not exclusively, in
immunocompromised hosts. The ultimate goals of REALIS are two fold: Firstly, it aims to
completely decipher all genes required for survival in and adaptation of <italic>Listeria monocytogenes</italic> 
to two very different environments, ie., the infected host and the external
environment. Secondly, using genomics and postgenomic tools, REALIS seeks to precisely
address fundamental questions regarding evolutionary relationships between pathogenic
and non-pathogenic Listeria and to define qualities of particularly successful clonal
pathovariants in causing disease. This project will provide both industry and health care
managers with rational approaches to curbing food-borne contamination, minimising risks
of infection and providing novel pharmacological approaches for halting the fulminant
course of infection.</p>
[]
Comp Funct Genomics. 2002 Feb; 3(1):32-34