Thank you to @vcallier.bsky.social and Quanta Magazine for highlighting our lab along with the incredible research from @soreklab.bsky.social @audeber.bsky.social @aaronwhiteley.bsky.social @benmorehouse.bsky.social @teralevin.bsky.social @algao.bsky.social Eugene Koonin, L. Aravind and others!

Want to annotate a bacterial genome with structures?

@oschwengers.bsky.social bakta and @gbouras13.bsky.social phold got together, and the result is Baktfold: protein annotation across the microbial tree of life using structures

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

#phagesky #microsky #microbiomesky

Bacterial 2′,3′-cGAMP activates a SAVED effector to form membrane-disrupting filaments and restrict phage replication Tak et al. discover that bacteria use 2′,3′-cGAMP, the same signaling molecule employed by mammalian cGAS-STING, for phage defense. In response to phage, 2′,3′-cGAMP activates filament formation of Ca...

Happy to share the final version of my postdoc work on bacterial CBASS immunity with @aaronwhiteley.bsky.social published in @cp-cellhostmicrobe.bsky.social

www.cell.com/cell-host-mi...

Single-molecule peptide sequencing through reverse translation of peptides into DNA - Nature Biotechnology Peptides are sequenced by converting each amino acid into amplifiable DNA barcodes.

Single-molecule peptide sequencing through reverse translation of peptides into DNA - @bioe-stanford.bsky.social go.nature.com/4sRPr2K

Capturing dynamic phage–pathogen coevolution by clinical surveillance @nature.com @ucberkeleyofficial.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Bacterial Schlafen proteins mediate phage defence Nature Microbiology, Published online: 09 March 2026; doi:10.1038/s41564-026-02277-8This study highlights that Schlafens are ancient, mechanistically conserved immune effectors that mediate antiviral immunity in organisms ranging from humans to bacteria.

Out Now! Bacterial Schlafen proteins mediate phage defence #MicroSky

🚨Preprint! Happy to share the research from my PhD “Genome delivery of a contractile tailed phage and its superinfection exclusion mechanism”. We use cryoEM to study the genome ejection of the phage T4, revealing how the tape measure protein regulates the process.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Elegant study from @erinhuiting.bsky.social @jbdsf.bsky.social on CBASS phage inhibition without loss of cell viability. Especially interesting to see this phenotype with a CapV membrane-targeting effector and evidence for 3'3'-cGAMP transport!

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

Multiple protein structure alignment at scale with FoldMason Protein structure is conserved beyond sequence, making multiple structural alignment (MSTA) essential for analyzing distantly related proteins. Computational prediction methods have vastly extended ou...

FoldMason is out now in @science.org. It generates accurate multiple structure alignments for thousands of protein structures in seconds. Great work by Cameron L. M. Gilchrist and @milot.bsky.social.
📄 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
🌐 search.foldseek.com/foldmason
💾 github.com/steineggerla...

Hello world! I am excited to announce my lab is open at the University of Utah in the Department of Biochemistry. We are looking for scientists at all levels interested in studying host-virus interactions in both bacteria and animals. Come join us in beautiful Utah! (photo is 10 steps from lab)

A phage protein screen identifies triggers of the bacterial innate immune system - Nature Microbiology A library of 400 phage protein-coding genes is used to find a trove of antiphage systems, revealing systems that target tail fibre and major capsid proteins.

I’m thrilled to share our work on phage triggers of the bacterial immune system in its final form @natmicrobiol.nature.com www.nature.com/articles/s41...

The multifaceted roles of NAD+ in bacterial immunity In this review, Vaysset and Bernheim examine how nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+) is a key player in diverse and widespread bacterial antiphage defense systems and phage counterdefense. The au...

Many antiphage systems use NAD+, in many ways.
@hugovaysset.bsky.social reviewed them all!

Read to know more about all their molecular mechanisms, how phages counteract them, their distribution in bacteria and their conservation in eukaryotic immunity!
www.cell.com/molecular-ce...

The Panoptes system uses decoy cyclic nucleotides to defend against phage - Nature The Panoptes antiphage system defends bacteria by detecting phage-encoded counter-defences that sequester cyclic nucleotide signals, triggering membrane disruption and highlighting a broader strategy of sensing immune evasion through second-messenger surveillance.

Our story describing the Panoptes bacterial immune defense system is now finally peer-reviewed and published today! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Blavatnik National Awards

Blavatnik National Awards

Blavatnik National Awards

Blavatnik National Awards

Congratulations to Philip J. Kranzusch, Ph.D., Professor of Cancer Immunology and Virology, who was one of three scientists awarded top honors at the 2025 Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists.

Watch to learn more about his work: bit.ly/4pZUDkF

Booby traps and viral sponges! Had a really great time with @reneechang.bsky.social distilling our research into a fun 30 sec video describing the arms race between bacteria and viruses. More info at blog.dana-farber.org/insight/2025...

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Manipulation of the nucleotide pool in human, bacterial and plant immunity - Nature Reviews Immunology Modification of the nucleotide pool is emerging as key to innate immunity in animals, plants and bacteria. This Review explains how immune pathways conserved from bacteria to humans manipulate the nuc...

We wrote a review on the free nucleotide pool as a central playground in human, bacterial, and plant immunity – now out in Nature Reviews in Immunology

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Was fun to write this piece with Dina Hochhauser!

Here is a thread to explain the premises

1/

A new preprint led by Sonomi Yamaguchi in our lab describes a bacterial anti-phage defense system named Clover that uses nucleotide signals to both activate and inhibit host immunity.

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

SAM-AMP lyases in type III CRISPR defence Abstract. Type III CRISPR systems detect non-self RNA and activate the enzymatic Cas10 subunit, which generates nucleotide second messengers for activation

Here we show how the type III signalling molecule SAM-AMP is bound and degraded by a specialised lyase enzyme encoded in cellular and phage genomes. More great work by @haotianchi.bsky.social and the team. @uniofstandrews.bsky.social
academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

Nuclease-NTPase systems use shared molecular features to control bacterial anti-phage defense Bacteria encode an enormous diversity of defense systems including restriction-modification and CRISPR-Cas that cleave nucleic acid to protect against phage infection. Bioinformatic analyses demonstra...

Starting the lab Bluesky account to share a preprint from @aragucci.bsky.social and @sadieantine.bsky.social‬ that reveals molecular principles shared across diverse nuclease-NTPase anti-phage defense systems in bacterial immunity (1/7)

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

A DNA-gated molecular guard controls bacterial Hailong anti-phage defence - Nature Animal and bacterial cells use nucleotidyltransferase (NTase) enzymes to respond to viral infection and control major forms of immune signaling including cGAS-STING innate immunity and CBASS anti-phage defence1-4. Here we discover a family of bacterial defence systems, which we name Hailong, that use NTase enzymes to constitutively synthesize DNA signals and guard against phage infection. Hailong protein B (HalB) is an NTase that converts deoxy-ATP into single-stranded DNA oligomers. A series of X-ray crystal structures define a stepwise mechanism of HalB DNA synthesis initiated by a C-terminal tyrosine residue that enables de novo enzymatic priming. We show that HalB DNA signals bind to and repress activation of a partnering Hailong protein A (HalA) effector complex. A 2.0 Å cryo-EM structure of the HalA–DNA complex reveals a membrane protein with a conserved ion channel domain and a unique crown domain that binds the DNA signal and gates activation. Analyzing Hailong defence in vivo, we demonstrate that viral DNA exonucleases required for phage replication trigger release of the primed HalA complex and induce protective host cell growth arrest. Our results explain how inhibitory nucleotide immune signals can serve as molecular guards against phage infection and expand the mechanisms NTase enzymes use to control antiviral immunity.

Nature research paper: A DNA-gated molecular guard controls bacterial Hailong anti-phage defence.

https://go.nature.com/4jXe4GO

Joel Tan of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

New research featured in @nature.com from Joel Tan of @danafarbernews.bsky.social’s Kranzusch Lab (kranzuschlab.med.harvard.edu) reports the first example of an inhibitory nucleotide immune signal. Read more: bit.ly/44bz6wW

Excited to share my PhD work in the Kranzusch Lab published in @nature.com!

Two key discoveries:
- Nucleotides can act as negative regulators of antiviral immunity
- Ion channel activation is gated by DNA

Thank you to our all collaborators! @soreklab.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41...