The outer membrane of Gram-negative bacteria blocks many antibiotics. Our latest work reveals that L-type pyocins bypass this barrier by inactivating the BAM complex, killing Pseudomonas aeruginosa without entering the cell, providing a new blueprint for beating antibiotic resistance.

New paper out, with a contribution from Dom Gurvic and I; led by Andy Lovering and @lalouxlab.bsky.social: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Previous preprint is now published in RSC Chemical Biology. If you are interested in plasma membrane labeling, see the paper! 👇 pubs.rsc.org/en/content/a...

A new methods paper from us, this time with a focus on reliable monitoring membrane potential and cell lysis at different growth stages and cell densities. Also, note the surprisingly high level of background lysis in seemingly healthy B. subtilis cultures. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Feels surreal to say but: I'm hiring! If you are or know anyone interested in looking at the evolution of phage resistance using A. baumannii and natural transformation, then this might be for you www.jobbnorge.no/en/available...

#microsky We challenge the long-standing view that peptidoglycan alone protects cells from bursting. Our study shows that the periplasm — enclosed by OM–PG connections — acts as a pressure buffer essential for osmoprotection in Gram-negative bacteria. 📄 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Superbugs could kill millions more and cost $2tn a year by 2050, models show www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

New Independent Fellowship position in Microbiology to launch your lab in our department @johninnescentre.bsky.social (UK). We are conducting a broad search in the area of plant-associated microbial interactions. Message me if you have any questions. Apply here: www.jic.ac.uk/vacancies/in...

Fascinating seminar by Prof @gebhardlab.bsky.social on ‘Building bacterial bridges – How an ancient bacterial trait can help us build the infrastructure of the future’ and visit at @cbcb-newcastle.bsky.social (hosted by @henrikstrahl.bsky.social) #bacillus #spores

New tenure track assistant professor position in molecular microbiology in our department @dmf-unil.bsky.social @unil.bsky.social! We are casting a wide net for an experimental molecular microbiologist. Apply here: wwwfbm.unil.ch/releve/appli...

Check out our latest preprint! We show that the same antibacterial toxin requires different immunity proteins depending whether it’s intra or extracellular

Check out this tour de force by Nils Meiresonne and colleagues, establishing FLIM-FRET as a reliable way to study protein interactions in live bacteria with spatiotemporal resolution! We open the door to exploring divisome protein interactions during cell division. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

We are recruiting for a PhD student who wants to understand how bacterial membranes are built and how they function. It would be a biology meets maths project … if this piques your interest take a look here: macsys.org/monash-phd-s... for project details and contact info

Big thanks to the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at University of Otago for hosting me for a sabbatical. I thoroughly enjoyed the stay! Time to travel slowly back to the UK (and start being a stranger on an island), but first a visit to IMB/University of Queensland.

This took us a while and I am all the happier it is finally out! I thought that simply adding ATP to purified potassium channel KtrAB should be sufficient to stabilize its active state. I was so wrong... Read the full story on how an IDR facilitates channel opening upon membrane interaction.

New paper out! Would you like to fluorescently label the plasma membrane in live, fixed or permeabilized cells? I tested different lipid structures and labelling approaches to decide what makes a good membrane labelling probe for such imaging experiments! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Bacterial cell envelope wonders. Always fascinating to learn about cell envelope biogenesis and see all the ingenious molecular tricks we can use to study it. Great work from the Colin Kleanthouse lab @oxfordbiochemistry.bsky.social Check at rb.gy/akaugi @pnas.org

Certainly worth attending! @matthieublandenet.bsky.social from our group will be discussing the bacterial cell wall and its role as a key antibiotic target.

Fellow bacterial cell biologists, message me if you use @thermofishersci.bsky.social Gene Frames for microscopy! Thermo are planning to discontinue these in September but have indicated they will look into this further. If I make list of labs using them Thermo might not kill the product Please RT🔬🦠

#Postdoc position - at the University of Marburg (Germany), funded within our ERC Advanced Grant "C-SWITCH" Focus: CTP-dependent molecular switches as a new principle of cellular regulation in bacteria (including bacteriophages) Apply by 04 May: stellenangebote.uni-marburg.de/jobposting/2...

We are looking for a postdoc with microbiology background for #superresolution #singlemolecule #ERC tracking project. Apply by 27.4.2025. 🦠🔬🧫 Pls share! www.aalto.fi/en/open-posi...

We have 3 positions for students who want to start a PhD in the next 12 months. If you like advanced fluorescence microscopy techniques and S. aureus cell biology, check links and apply(April 4) euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/325394 euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/325395 euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/325396

Looking for a PhD opportunity in Microbiology? Consider joining one of the strongest clusters of microbiology research in UK at @newcastleuni.bsky.social, Biosciences Institute, and @cbcb-newcastle.bsky.social. See thread for BBSRC DTP PhD studentships currently advertised.

Dissecting Gram-negative envelope biogenesis to understand drug delivery in Gram-negative pathogens. Supervised by Manuel Banzhaf, @thecopperdoctor.bsky.social and @henrikstrahl.bsky.social. www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

(It took a while to travel this far but) its good to be finally in Dunedin!

This was a fantastic collaboration with our neighbors @mblokesch.bsky.social & David Adams and Mark Szczelkun and @steven-shaw.bsky.social in Bristol. Special thanks to the DCI for invaluable support with cryo-EM of a rather difficult target! @drhonsworth.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Excited to be heading to the University of Otago for my sabbatical at the Department of Microbiology and Immunology! Looking forward to meeting everyone. Big thanks to Rachel Darnell and Greg Cook for organising, and to the Royal Society of New Zealand (@royalsocietynz.bsky.social) for the support!

Excited to share with you the story that enabled me to start my own lab: what happens when the bacterial DNA replication machinery encounters single-strand discontinuities on template DNA? What is required for break repair and replication restart? www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

We are searching for a new professor in genetics (W3) at Osnabrück University. Come and join us. 👇 www.uni-osnabrueck.de/universitaet...

Congratulations to CBCB PhD-student Taylor @taylorwr.bsky.social and his team for being awarded best consideration of IP strategy and social media prizes for their theoretical project "DiagnosTree" in the YES competition. www.yescompetitions.co.uk/showcase/new...

New preprint 🚨: with @madejmar.bsky.social we found that the Bacteroidetes beta-barrel assembly machinery is quite different to E. coli. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... #cryo-EM

We are happy to join the science community at BlueSky! #MicroSky

A new class of penicillin-binding protein inhibitors to address drug-resistant Neisseria gonorrhoeae https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.12.27.630553v1

Great to see this finally out at BioRxiv! #microsky

Finally! Who's is next (Germany, looking at you 🧐). www.timeshighereducation.com/news/finland...

Jess Buttress (@jbuttresssci.bsky.social) from my group has just joined BlueSky. Certainly worth following!

Deadline - this Friday

All cells are encapsulated by a membrane of complex lipidic composition, right? Not anymore! @JamesSaenz.bsky.social et al. show that a ‘minimal’ bacterial cell only needs 2 lipid species #microNatComms #Microbiology #CellBiology #lipids Read the paper: www.nature.com/artic...#microNatComms

The Thomas & Parkin labs are looking for a motivated PhD student to work across the biology/chemistry interface to help UK biotech company HydRegen improve biocatalyst production. The project is to understand & engineer increased nickel uptake in bacteria as part of BBSRC Yorkshire Bioscience DTP.

PhD projects available in our lab all listed in the below link. All focus on bacterial gene regulation, in the context of basic understanding, disease, or antibiotic resistance. Deadlines in January... www.findaphd.com/phds/?Keywor...

Big congratulations Jonathan Norris for a successful viva! Also thanks to Ramesh Wigneshweraraj and Colin Harwood as the expert viva examiners. One more CBCB-trained young scientist to celebrate (co-supervised by Nikolay Zenkin and me)!

The Natural Products Atlas 3.0: extending the database of microbially derived natural products - thanks to the Linington lab for letting the Duncan lab be part of the curation efforts academic.oup.com/nar/advance-... #NaturalProducts #SpecializedMetabolites #microsky #microbialchemistry

www.findaphd.com/phds/project... #microsky

www.findaphd.com/phds/project... #microsky

Few more weeks to apply for this exciting antibiotics discovery project! Also check the thread for other great projects on offer at Newcastle. #microsky

We are scouting for a PhD student in antiphage immunity. Starting spring 2025 at University of Tartu, Estonia, secondments at Lund. Please contact me with i) CV and ii) max 2-page cover letter (why you, why this topic and why our team) at [email protected]. RT appreciated!

Abstract deadline 13th Dec #AMR #antibiotics #microsky please share 🙏🏻

Great review by @pinholab.bsky.social and Simon Foster on the current knowledge regarding growth, elongation and division of Staphylococcus aureus www.annualreviews.org/content/jour...

🚨 New paper alert! 🚨 MinD is famously known for positioning FtsZ at mid-cell in bacteria In our study, myself and @iduggin.bsky.social found that MinD homologues in Haloferax volcanii influence the localisation of CetZ1, a homologue of FtsZ and tubulin #Archaeasky #Microsky