📢 Funded PhD in molecular microbiology & phage biology How do bacterial stress responses control prophage activation and horizontal gene transfer? Join us at St Andrews to dissect Clp protease–mediated regulation in Staphylococcus aureus. Apply: www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

A short research stay in 2019 (back in the pre-COVID era) at José R. Penadés lab turned into the third chapter of my PhD and today it finally sees the light.

On this fabulous day celebrating André Citroën's birthday 🥖🚗, I’m happy to share my main paper from my postdoc in @jrpenades.bsky.social Lab. If you want to hear about how plasmid evolution is driven by mobile genetic elements, please come and read this preprint! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

A new paper from the lab on virus-like particles called eCISs www.nature.com/articles/s41... How bacteria evolved thousands of precision nanoinjectors? Some bacteria don’t secrete toxins — they inject them using phage-derived machines called extracellular contractile injection systems (eCISs).

A prophage-encoded sRNA limits phage infection of adherent-invasive E. coli #PLoSPathogen from @prsecor.bsky.social journals.plos.org/plospathogen...

[1/3] Is your favorite bacterial isolate hiding a surprise lytic virus with a VERY different lifestyle? Finally I can proudly say that our paper on persistent phages is out in Nature Microbiology. rdcu.be/eWJEp. Well done @peterdoug.bsky.social

The final form of my 2nd postdoc paper with the Bassler Lab! Turns out our favorite quorum-sensing phage isn’t a one-off, but rather a member of a globally dispersed family of phages that sense a universal autoinducer. #phagesky #microsky journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

Do viruses use RNA to rewire bacteria? Yes! In our paper in @cp-molcell.bsky.social RIL-seq reveals interkingdom RNA interactions during λ infection. Phages don’t just encode proteins, they use small RNAs to hijack bacterial replication and fine-tune infection. #RNA #Phage doi.org/10.1016/j.mo...

🚨Preprint alert - this is a big one! We transfer the revolutionary power of TnSeq to bacteriophages. Our HIDEN-SEQ links the "dark matter" genes of your favorite phage to any selectable phenotype, guiding the path from fun observations to molecular mechanisms. A thread 1/8

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... #microsky #phagesky #phage

Independent research fellowships leading to tenured positions at the John Innes Centre. Repost = nice. Thank you very much!!!

We discovered a new horizontal gene transfer mechanism: tail-less cf-PICIs hijack free phage tails extracellularly, forming infectious chimeric virions that drive both intra- and inter-species transfer among bacteria. @jonaszpatkowski.bsky.social @tcostalab.bsky.social @jrpenades.bsky.social

Thrilled to share our two latest papers with the @tcostalab.bsky.social lab! In the first, we uncover a new mechanism of satellite transfer: cf-PICIs hijack tails from diverse phages to spread across species. @imperialcollegeldn.bsky.social www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

Thrilled to share that two of our papers with @jrpenades.bsky.social & GoogleDeepMind are now out in @cellpress.bsky.social 1️⃣Microbial piracy: tinyurl.com/yvf6t3b3 2️⃣AI co-scientist mirrors experimental science: tinyurl.com/2dym92kj @imperialcollegeldn.bsky.social @imperiallifesci.bsky.social

New review 🔥 Single-cell RNA-Seq has been revolutionary for studying eukaryotic cells and now it's time for it to do the same for microbes! We describe the technology for single-bacterium RNA-Seq & the questions now studied using it.🧵⬇️ science.org/doi/10.1126/... @andrewpountain.bsky.social

What is everyone's favourite review on anti-phage/defence systems? Ideally as an introduction to the concept/key systems for undergraduate level without expertise in phage biology #MicroSky #PhageSky

New paper in collaboration with the @asantoslopez.bsky.social lab! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Why do some people age more healthily than others? The answer may come, in part, from our guts and the massive community of microbes living in them. Discover how aging shapes—and is shaped by—the gut microbiota: asm.org/Articles/202...

Today, Professor Donal Wall, @uofglasgow.bsky.social attended a pitch session as part of the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee's 'Under the Microscope' inquiry to explain why they should be interested in microbiomes.

Let’s talk about/with/to phage!

I got hit by some rather sudden and extreme financial hardship so if anyone is in need of remote wetlab contract research, strictly BSL1, do let me know. Currently scrambling for gigs. Plant, Bacterial, Archaeal Non-model Bioeng Custom Lab Hardware Turn Key Genetic Design Please repost for reach 💚

Gene editing and many other useful biotechnology tools came from studies of bacteria fighting off viral invaders, but scientists have only begun to unlock the secrets of this microbial warfare. Read the Nature feature on what breakthroughs could be next. 🧪

I was waiting two years to see this out!! The genomic location of bacterial genes is not random!!! Congratulation on the authors (Martin Lercher and Team!). www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

The BASEL collection of E. coli #phages is limited by its host strain. @humollidorentina.bsky.social @damienpiel.bsky.social @aharms485.bsky.social &co use a modified host to add 36 new phages, revealing roles of O-antigen in recognition & R-M systems in immunity @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/4jirGvX

PhD opportunity in a fantastic topic with great supervisors. Check it out!

If you are interested in phage satellites, we hope you'll enjoy this. Fun collaboration with the Rocha, Seed, Bikard, and Chen labs! rdcu.be/efkvG

We welcome on BlueSky Alfred Fillol Salom @alfredfisa.bsky.social, the leader of the The Ecology of Mobile Genetic Elements group at our research institute #microsky 🧫🦠🧪 #phages #virology #viruses

Made a feed for phage papers/discussions/friends! Please feel free to pin this feed to your bluesky profile and if you wish to add to the feed, simply add the #phage hashtag (NOT case sensitive) and the feed will aggregate the posts. See you there! Please repost🙏🏽

Re-posts appreciated! We have an open PhD position w/ Prof Harold Auradou on #microswimmers/#protists in complex media! Students get to spend at least 12 months in Paris, and will receive their PhD from both Exeter and Paris-Saclay! Apply by 31st Mar. More details: adum.fr/as/ed/voirpr...

My lab’s first preprint! We used functional metagenomics to identify phage defenses in human and soil microbiomes. We scaled these selections while maintaining accuracy, enabling us to examine 9 habitats for defense elements against 7 phages. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... 1/10

A prophage-encoded anti-phage defense system that prevents phage DNA packaging by targeting the terminase complex https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.02.27.640495v1

It is finally out! Muntathar Al-Shimary, @doudna-lab.bsky.social , @cresslab.bsky.social and I present a gene knockdown tool that works in diverse bacteriophages: CRISPRi through antisense RNA Targeting (CRISPRi-ART)! Check it out @naturemicrobiol.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

I'm so happy that I can finally share the results of my first postdoc paper with @baym.lol!!! Turns out plasmids are an amazing system to study multi-scale evolution and we can track within-cell and between-cell dynamics! (1/n) www.biorxiv.org/content/earl...

Chimeric infective particles expand species boundaries in phage inducible chromosomal island mobilization https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.02.11.637232v1

Many of us, and especially early-career scientists, are facing huge challenges now. However, one of the joys of science is to delve into thinking about research. In that spirit, I offer this blog post on starting a microbial evolution experiment. telliamedrevisited.wordpress.com/2025/02/08/h...

☎️ Calling #MEvoSky ☎️ 2x 5-year research associate / research assistant positions in experimental evolution ERC-funded project: How do mobile genetic elements and defence systems shape bacterial genome evolution? Join the friendly and exciting @mermanchester.bsky.social community in Manchester!

🚨 🧬 Updated preprint on the completed BASEL collection - what's new? Some fun with bacterial immunity and a new P22 relative infecting E. coli K-12. A thread 🧵

Headline click bait but this is an excellent bit size interview. Sometimes Guardian science hits the mark. www.theguardian.com/science/2025...

Many people talk about the "Golden Age of Antibiotics", but I hadn't seen it visualized properly. Just how many types of antibiotics were discovered during that time? So, I visualized it myself!

Happy to see this multi country collaboration published in @cp-cellreports.bsky.social led by Polonca and Anna Ecology of prophage-like elements in Bacillus subtilis at global and local geographical scales www.cell.com/cell-reports... #Phage #Bacillussubtilis #MicrobiomeEcology at #LeidenBiology

The mycomembrane differentially and heterogeneously restricts antibiotic permeation https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.12.31.630956v1

Persistent virulent phages exist in bacterial isolates https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.12.31.630880v1

www.nature.com/articles/s41... New paper out!!