My super department @warwicklifesci.bsky.social is hiring 6 assistant profs in the wake of recent retirements. We're looking for people in microbiology/infection, cellular disease / immunity; environmental biology; and plant/crop science. #MicroSky warwick-careers.tal.net/vx/lang-en-G...

And I finally took some time off with my wife to be a real tourist in the UK for once! Lots of walking for the rest of the week, but had a great trip 🙂 till the next time UK!

Finished my work trip earlier this week with a visit and seminar at @imperialcollegeldn.bsky.social - many thanks to @bugsinblood.bsky.social for playing host! Great catch up with Gadi Frankel too! Most coincidentally, met @hendersonlab.bsky.social on ICL campus - what are the odds?!

Found time to meet f2f for the first time and catch up with Yin Chen, who co-supervised a joint Warwick-A*STAR student!

Had lots of fun too at the Memb Prot Conf in Birmingham a few days prior, getting to know @chrismulligan.bsky.social, @gavinhthomas.bsky.social, @allistercrow.bsky.social, @renaeryan.bsky.social and catching up Andy Lovering, Jani Bolla, @pstansfeld.bsky.social & @davidroper2.bsky.social of course!

Thanks @pstansfeld.bsky.social and @davidroper2.bsky.social for hosting a wonderful visit last week at Warwick! Great discussions also with @chelseabrown.bsky.social, @allistercrow.bsky.social and @melissawebby.bsky.social! Definitely looking fwd to more Warwick-NUS interactions!

Thanks Vivek!

Thanks Cristina!

Thanks Zam!

One day, we may yet be able to design anti-conjugation strategies that can slow down spread of virulence and antibiotic resistance. Hopefully this story excites you just as it excited us! Give it a read and let us know what you think! Kudos and congrats to the team led by Liyana OW YONG! 7/7

We think AbjA disrupts TrbE oligomerization, causing runaway ATP hydrolysis that leads to abortive death. Since TrbE (VirB4 homolog) is a critical component of the conjugation apparatus, AbjA is a defense factor specific against conjugation, acting via the novel mech of 'abortive conjugation'! 6/7

After moving to my lab, Liyana employed extensive genetics (systematic deletions & suppressor mutations), aided by @yeowjiang.bsky.social doing biochemistry (affinity purification), successfully established that the target of AbjA is in fact the TrbE ATPase that powers T4SS nec for conjugation! 5/7

He was right! Liyana & others found that a single gene AbjA is necessary & sufficient to make bacterial strains poor recipients of a specific set of plasmids via conjugation (& transformation too). Apparently, the presence of AbjA and the specific plasmid in the recipient triggers cell death... 4/7

A set of powerful negative selection systems for unmodified Enterobacteriaceae Abstract. Creation of defined genetic mutations is a powerful method for dissecting mechanisms of bacterial disease; however, many genetic tools are only d

Well, Swaine had this idea that recipient cells should have ways to defend specifically against bacterial conjugation. Using a universal donor strain (engineered to contain a powerful negative selection system Swaine's lab had developed academic.oup.com/nar/article/...), he went looking... 3/7

Not our typical focus area of bact cell envelope assembly, but still involving envelope proteins of course! The story begun with Liyana moving to our lab when Swaine CHEN left SG >2 yrs ago, bringing over this interesting project! Just like that, we started to step into a new field (to me)! 2/7

Here is it! Super new science from us on horizontal gene transfer & bact defense systems! Liyana OW YONG discovered the first-of-its-kind defense factor AbjA that triggers 'abortive conjugation' as a defense mechanism, by targeting the T4SS! How neat?! #MicroSky 1/7

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Congrats Olivier!

When it rains myco publications in pours myco publications!
Now out in PNAS tinyurl.com/2a6833n4
When @zestytoast.bsky.social accidentally isolated the long-chain acyl-CoA carboxylase, we quickly realized we were looking at a fascinating machine essential for building the mycobacterial membrane...

Still not in the final format but couldn't wait to share it with you, after a long jpurney to get here. Our latest work (with @davidalbesa.bsky.social lab) on Tke5 T6SS toxin from my favourite bug P. putida KT2440. 🧵 1/5 www.nature.com/articles/s42...

PcdA promotes orthogonal division plane selection in Staphylococcus aureus - Nature Microbiology PcdA interacts with DivIVA and FtsZ, promoting Z-ring formation and division plane selection in Staphylococcus aureus, which increases virulence in mice and reduces sensitivity to cell-wall-targeting ...

@felixrl.bsky.social reported that PcdA mediates orthogonal cell division in #Staphylococcus aureus: www.nature.com/articles/s41....

But what’s the point? Well, forming staphylococcal abscess communities to evade host immune responses requires this mode of division:
www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

Bacteriocin biophysics: From protein-protein interaction models to navigators of the bacterial cell envelope Bacteriocins are toxins deployed by bacteria to kill their competitors. Here, I reflect on my laboratory’s work on protein bacteriocins and their immunity proteins from Gram-negative bacteria. We unco...

A gift of an article from the inimitable Colin Kleanthous as he says a moving farewell to his laboratory. A brave, unrepentant and scientifically brilliant journey is described - please have a read, friends.

www.jbc.org/article/S002...

Acidic pH Restricts Non‐Tuberculous Mycobacteria Replication Different nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) species display unique replication profiles in acidic pH in vitro which correlates to their replication within human macrophages. Inhibition of the acidic ...

Very happy to see this out! Great work by @lockwop.bsky.social @crick.ac.uk and first paper on NTMs from the lab! Parise made a set of 12 fluorescently labelled NTMs covering environmental and opportunistic mycobacteria...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

AI agent Fleming accelerates antibiotic discovery for Mycobacterium tuberculosis by integrating generative and predictive models, achieving 83% in-vitro hit rates and identifying novel compounds with favorable ADMET profiles across unexplored chemical space.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

I’m pleased 🤗 to share our new preprint exploring the mode of action and resistance of the antitubercular drug pyrazinamide (PZA) 💊 Thanks to everyone who have participated 🙌
We hope these findings will help the fight against drug resistance in tuberculosis.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

🌀 We solved the structure for T. denticola periplasmic flagella!

I'm very happy to finally showcase this work. A huge collaborative effort between myself, @bindusmitapaul.bsky.social, @debnathghosal.bsky.social, Jack Kim, @banfieldlab.bsky.social, Eric Reynolds and the Chris Fenno lab.

🦠 Enjoy!

Check out our new preprint! We show that tension drives mixing of phase separated membranes!

Beautiful and solid work on trehalose monomycolate synthesis in mycobacteria by @figlegend.bsky.social lab. Check it out folks. Also, for the non-enzymologists, product inhibition is a thing, and actually does matter. 😜

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Many thanks Luiz for the shout out! All credit goes to @yushuchen.bsky.social!

Also extremely happy to see work finally published! Kudos to @yushuchen.bsky.social's tenacity and hard work! Read our previous thread and the paper itself for details/updates! Happy to chat if you find our findings interesting! #MicroSky

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Zhi-Soon and Jacob also found that the AsmA sf protein YhdP interacts stably/specifically with DedD, which binds cell wall primarily at the division site. We offer some prelim thoughts for why/when this interaction might occur, despite seemingly distinct localization patterns. Lots to think abt! 3/3