We had two fantastic visiting speakers today MERMan alumnus @rowancallumg.bsky.social spoke about his current work with viral cheating in influenza with @asherleeks.bsky.social And @lavishaparab.bsky.social talked about phage infection trade-offs Thanks to @microbesng.bsky.social for our snacks!

More amazing posters presented by our researchers @zahraaalbaqsami.bsky.social and Rana at #MicroEvo25!

What a week! Thanks to everyone who attended the UK Phage Therapy workshop and #MicroEvo25 in Liverpool… every talk, poster, question, chat, and round of applause helps to build our microbial evolution community! Thanks to @microbiologysociety.org and @ukri.org for support

So proud of @magdalenakurteu.bsky.social, so much effort goes into everything she does and her presentations always have such amazing hand drawn figures - very well deserved 👏🏼

So excited to be here for @microbiologysociety.org ‘s #microevo25 meeting!

Fantastic talk about the impact of inflammation on Pseudomonas aeruginosa evolution by @taoranfu.bsky.social #MicroEvo25

Come and see @willpjsmith.bsky.social at poster 71 to find out more about microbial warfare! #MicroEvo25

Learn about hot spring microbial communities from @magdalenakurteu.bsky.social at poster 62 🌋 #MicroEvo25

Find out more about DNA repair protein single-molecule tracking from @bexlowrypalms.bsky.social at poster 18🔬 #MicroEvo25

Metagenomic editing of commensal bacteria in vivo using CRISPR-associated transposases www.science.org/doi/abs/10.1... #jcampubs

✨I am thrilled to announce that my #ERCStG project will be funded by @erc.europa.eu. It explores how predatory bacteria interact with bacteria, which they invade and kill 🔬. I am very grateful to the ERC, the panel, reviewers, mentors, collaborators and colleagues! 🙏 #ERCStG => tiny.cc/174s001

Happy to share that our story on the bacterial archaellum was published today in @natmicrobiol.nature.com www.nature.com/articles/s41... Congrats to the authors: @sshamphavi.bsky.social @loumollat.bsky.social @mariejoest.bsky.social Najwa Taib and @sgribaldo.bsky.social

Can Pseudomonas spp. Biocontrols help us to tackle Kiwi Canker? Isabella Frost is finding out! #PPATH2025

Pseudomonas is under attack again, with Rebecca Lowry Palmer harnessing Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus as a Biocontrol Agent Against Pseudomonas syringae in Tomato Plants. #ECPP2025 #PPATH2025

Very excited to be in Nottingham for the @bspp.bsky.social #bspp2025 giving a talk and poster presentation on my work with Bdellovibrio, plants and microbial evolution 🌱

Bacterial #QuorumSensing is often assumed to follow a strict hierarchy. @brownlab.bsky.social &co find that #Pseudomonas aeruginosa instead uses a reciprocal, cooperative system that enhances responsiveness to population density & environmental changes @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/3I7DhRG

closing at the end of this week!

👏👏👏 incredible stuff

We are also hiring a 4-year postdoc to study the dynamics and evolution of mobile genetic elements in the C-fixing Icelandic host-spring microbiomes Join our exciting multidisciplinary team funded by @ukri.org BBSRC sLoLa www.jobs.manchester.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...

The most divine break in Wales with my wild ones ☀️🌊🐚

Happy share this latest study from the team. Here we look at placental macrophage biology across pregnany and their interaction with Listeria monocytogenes. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Charlie Mo: generic trade off in phage resistance leads to betalactam susceptibility and down-regulation of virulence genes in phage-resistant #MRSA strains #phages2025 🦠 elifesciences.org/articles/102...

Interested in investigating the use of bacteriocins for the treatment of urinary tract infections? Come work with me and @bugsinyourguts.bsky.social Professor Lesley Hoyles as a research associate on an exciting project funded by The Urology Foundation vacancies.ntu.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...

Very proud to have our lab’s first work published in @cp-cellhostmicrobe.bsky.social! In this work, we use functional metagenomics to find phage defenses from human and soil microbiomes! Congrats to first author @luis840alberto.bsky.social ! www.cell.com/cell-host-mi... (1/3)

New paper alert! A real time PCR assay to detect and distinguish Klebsiella pneumonia, quasipneumoniae and variicola. @microbiologysociety.org @sylvainbrisse.bsky.social www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/jour...

After many years in the making, here is our host range #phage paper with #ecology, #evolution and #biocontrol perspectives published in Molecular Ecology! @phimresearch.bsky.social‬ @inrae-pv.bsky.social‬ #PVBMT #JulianGarneau onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... These are our key findings:

More on R-pyocins here www.nature.com/articles/s44...

Do plasmids evolve faster 🐇, slower 🐢, or just like chromosomes 🧬? In our new paper, we tackled this question using theory, simulations, bioinformatics, and experiments! 👇 Check out all the details in Paula’s thread! Hint: 🐇 (most of the time)

Check out these amazing lipid-monolayer-trapping oligomeric OMPs published by @lalouxlab.bsky.social and Lovering Labs. The BAM complex in these bugs must be wild! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

#MicroSky Summer read! Predatory bacteria kill and eat other bacteria. Their deadly actions come in many flavors, often via direct physical contact between predator & prey 🧛 How do they do it? Our review 📖 @coralietesseur.bsky.social @ysantin.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Allotment Sunday

My little work buddy today - poorly but there's always energy for painting and a thousand activities 🤦🏻‍♀️😬🎨

Fresh from peer review a new and improved version of @taoranfu.bsky.social’s paper out today in @asm.org mSystems journals.asm.org/eprint/8NWNW...

Exciting opportunities to join me in this research will be coming soon! If you're passionate about understanding microbial evolution & tackling antimicrobial resistance, keep an eye out or feel free to get in touch. 🔬🧬 🍄 #AMR #Microbiology #Evolution

Interested in working on Mucorales adaptation? Thanks to new funding from @wellcometrust.bsky.social, we will have two postdoc and a technician positions advertised very soon! if interested, please get in touch for more information.

Go Team! Deeply honoured that the MERMan lab reps won an @manchester.ac.uk‬ "FMBH heroes" award - thanks ‪@fbmh-uom.bsky.social‬ and @mermanchester.bsky.social for nominating us ❤️❤️❤️

Learning from bacterial predators on porin-like proteins that trap lipids at rdcu.be/euXWk! Amazing insights by Rebecca J. Parr & Andrew L. Lovering @unibirmingham.bsky.social, and @lalouxlab.bsky.social,‬ as well as all collaborators including Liz Sockett. #MicroSky #predatoryBacteria #porins

Allllll the allotment flowers are coming out. Yes one is a potato flower, but aren't they amazing (top left)!?

The MHRA today released new guidance for #Phage therapy in the UK. This will provide direction for scientists and researchers working to make this treatment a reality for patients. 🔬 🧪 🔗 www.gov.uk/government/n...

🛠️Toolbox 🛠️ out to modulate gene expression & protein secretion in a predatory bacterium. 📑Preprint from my group below. Many thanks to L. Mihajlovic @ljmihajlovic.bsky.social, L. Hofacker, F. Lindner, P. Jayakumar & A. Diepold @diepold-lab.bsky.social! #MicroSky #SyntheticBiology #PredatoryBacteria

👏🏽 lovely preprint from @simonahuwiler.bsky.social

Some nasty infections going on in my lab plants and it makes me so happy 🤣

Yorkshire rose joy 🩷 #allotment

May’s ‘Microbe of the Month’ is a novel archaeon called Methanobrevibacter intestini which was isolated from a human faecal sample taken from an individual in the United States. Find out more about M. intestini and other exciting discoveries by clicking the link in our bio 🧫🔬

My little allotment tulip patch bringing all the joy 💐

It's been a steep learning curve but I've absolutely loved my first venture into plant research 🤩🌱🌿

MERMan's very own @flanagella.bsky.social 🥳🥳🥳 well done!

Read the written evidence here: committees.parliament.uk/writtenevide...

Led by @willpjsmith.bsky.social our AMR evolution evidence to parliament makes 3 main points: 1. Understanding of within patient evolution will improve treatments 2. Incentivise resistance-durability in new abx & mandate AMR data in trials 3. Prioritise multi-pronged research into abx alternatives

Oh my, 10 years ago I finished my PhD 😱