OxBacNet


OxBacNet – a networking group, linking bacteriologists working in Oxford.


Organised by Judith Armitage (Dept. of Biochemistry, judith.armitage@bioch.ox.ac.uk) and Philip Poole (Dept.of Biology, philip.poole@biology.ox.ac.uk), we aim to have three meetings a year, held on Wednesday afternoon of fourth week each term.  There will be research talks by senior and junior scientists (either by Zoom or ‘in person’ meetings), and when held in the Dept. of Biology, followed by opportunities for networking (and  pizza!)

If you would like to be added to the mailing list, please contact alison.east@biology.ox.ac.uk

OxBacNet is grateful for the support of Oxford’s Bacteriology Project Leaders.

OxBacNet Symposium – Trinity Term 

17th May 2023 – all welcome!

To be held in: Large Lecture Theatre, Dept. of Biology (SPR), South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3RB

2pm Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Biology)
2pm Mariagrazia Pizza (Visiting Newton Professor, Sir William Dunn School of Pathology) m.pizza@imperial.ac.uk Characterization of immune response following vaccination with the 4CMenB vaccine
2.30pm Abraham Oluwole (Dept. of Chemistry) abraham.oluwole@chem.ox.ac.ukInterrogating antimicrobial targets by mass spectrometry
2.50pm Marion Schuller (Sir William Dunn School of Pathology) marion.schuller@path.ox.ac.uk The toxin-antitoxin system DarTG
3.10pm Hayley Knights (Dept. of Biology) hayley.knights@biology.ox.ac.uk Genome-wide identification of root colonisation determinants in Rhizobium leguminosarum
3.30pm TEA BREAK in the Common Room, Dept. of Biology (SPR)
4pm Vivian Yeung (Dept. of Biochemistry) vivian.yeung@bioch.ox.ac.uk Protein import through the TonB-dependent siderophore transporter FpvAI in Pseudomonas aeruginosa
4.20pm Viktoria Brunner (Nuffield Dept. of Medicine) viktoria.brunner@dtc.ox.ac.ukLarge-scale identification of compensatory mutations in the RNA polymerase of M. tuberculosis
4.40pm Amy Flaxman (Oxford Vaccine Group) amy.flaxman@paediatrics.ox.ac.uk Vaccine and challenge studies for S. Typhi and Paratyphi at Oxford Vaccine Group
5pm Irina Chelysheva (Oxford Vaccine Group) irina.chelysheva@paediatrics.ox.ac.uk The use of the controlled human infection model to combat AMR
5.20pm Beer and Pizza in the Common Room, Dept. of Biology (SPR)

Previous meetings:

Jan 2023 (Hilary)

08:55 – 09:00 Welcome – Christoph Tang (Dunn School of Pathology)
Session 1 Chairs: Judy Armitage & Martin Jahn
09:00 – 09:30 Evolutionary ecology of CRISPR and anti-CRISPR phages Stineke van Houte (University of Exeter)
09:30 – 09:45 Ecological interactions in the human gut microbiome Xuedan Wang (Foster lab, Dept. of Biology)
09:45 – 10:00 Microscopic dissection of E. coli Tol-Pal function Joanna Szczepaniak (Kleanthous lab, Dept. of Biochemistry)
10:00 – 10:15 Nasopharyngeal competition dynamics are likely to be altered following vaccine introduction: bacteriocin prevalence and diversity among Icelandic and Kenyan pneumococci Angela Brueggemann (Nuffield Dept. of Population Health)
10:15 – 10:30 Cellular immune dysfunction in response to bacteria in diabetes Barbara Kronsteiner-Dobramysl (Dunachie lab, Nuffield Dept. of Medicine)
10:30 – 11:00 Tea & Coffee break
Session 2 Chairs: Colin Kleanthous & Tanuka Sen
11:00 – 11:15 Novel antibody-peptide conjugate against multi-drug resistant Neisseria gonorrhoeae Hayley Lavender (Tang lab, Dunn School of Pathology)
11:15 – 11:30 ADP-ribosylation signalling and toxin-antitoxin systems Ivan Ahel (Dunn School of Pathology)
11:30 – 11:45 Evolutionary drivers of Antimicrobial resistance Craig MacLean (Dept. of Biology)
11:45 – 12:00 Predicting antibiotic resistance in tuberculosis de novo using protein structure-based machine learning and free energy calculations Phil Fowler (Nuffield Dept. of Medicine)
12:00 – 12:15 Discovery of a novel iminosugar glycosidase inhibitor and its biosynthesis in Pseudomonas syringae Nattapong Sanguankiattichai (Preston lab, Dept. of Biology)
12:15 – 12:30 The global burden and surveillance of AMR research in the IOI Chioma Achi (Ineos Oxford Institute)
12:30 – 14:00 Lunch
Session 3 Chairs: Christoph Tang & Lulu Liu
14:00 – 14:30 Using immunity to manipulate the microbial ecology of the intestine Emma Slack (ETH, Zurich)
14:30 – 14:45 Deep learning/single cell phenotyping for rapid AMR detection Piers Turner (Kapanidis lab, Dept. of Physics)
14:45 – 15:00 A vaccine for melioidosis Susanna Dunachie (Nuffield Dept. of Medicine)
15:00 – 17:00 Posters, Tea/Coffee
Session 4 Chairs: Ashleigh Griffin & Jo Szczepaniak
17:00 – 17:15 Engineering Bacteria (SimCells) for Therapy Yutong Yin (Dept. of Engineering Science)
17:15 – 17:30 Bacterial genome-wide association studies: from comparative genomics to gene function Sam Sheppard (Dept. of Biology)
17:30 – 17:45 Direct observation of transcription reaction cycles in vivo using single-particle tracking at the minute timescale Oliver Pambos (Kapanidis lab, Dept. of Physics)
19.20 – Dinner at Hertford College, Catte Street

Nov 2022 (Michaelmas)

2pm Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Biology)
2pm David Sauer (Centre for Medicines Discovery) The DASS family of carboxylate transporters
2.30pm Colin Kleanthous (Dept. of Biochemistry) Organisational principles of the bacterial outer membrane
3pm Hee-Jeon Hong (Brookes University) Actinomycetes: bacteria with important biotech applications
3.30pm TEA BREAK in the Common Room, Dept. of Biology (SPR)
4pm Future Meeting Announcement: Christoph Tang (Sir William Dunn School of Pathology)
4.05pm Raphael Ledermann (Dept. of Biology) Polyamines are crucial for maintaining nitrogen-fixing bacteroids
4.20pm Saifur Rahman (Dept. of Biology) A One Health approach to understanding Klebsiella pneumoniae virulence and antimicrobial resistance from Bangladesh
4.35pm Sean Booth (Dept. of Biology) Bows and swords: why bacteria carry short and long-range weapon
4.50pm Connor Sharp (Dept. of Biology) Colicin Plasmid Diversity: From ColA – ColZ
5.05pm Erik Bakkeren (Dept. of Biology) Principles of microbiota-mediated protection against bacterial gut pathogens
5.20pm Jad Sassine (Dept. of Biochemistry) CTD cleavage by CcpA permits faster substrate release in T9SS
5.35pm Beer and Pizza in the Common Room, Dept. of Biology (SPR)

May 2022 (Trinity)

2pm Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
2pm Georgia Isom, Sir William Dunn School of Pathology georgia.isom@path.ox.ac.uk Lipid transport for the bacterial outer membrane through periplasmic-spanning tunnels and bridges
2.30pm Matthew Stracy, Sir William Dunn School of Pathology mathew.stracy@path.ox.ac.uk  Minimizing treatment-induced emergence of antibiotic resistance in bacterial infections
3pm Jani Bolla, Dept. of Plant Sciences jani.bolla@plants.ox.ac.ukPeptidoglycan biosynthesis is driven by lipid transfer along enzyme-substrate affinity gradients
3.30pm TEA BREAK in the Common Room, Dept. of Plant Sciences
4pm Chloe Cassaro, Dept. of Biochemistry chloe.cassaro@dtc.ox.ac.uk Imaging bacterial stress responses to DNA-damaging antibacterial agents
4.15pm Isidro Abreu, Dept. of Plant Sciences isidro.abreu@plants.ox.ac.uk Ironing out Fe homeostasis in nitrogen-fixing endosymbiotic rhizobia
4.30pm India Brough, The Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology, india.brough@ndorms.ox.ac.uk Commensal microbiota drive systemic inflammatory arthritis
4.45pm Rebecca Jeffery, The Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology,  rebecca.jeffery@kennedy.ox.ac.uk Understanding host-bacterial and bacterial-bacterial interactions that support intestinal inflammation
5pm Patrick Inns, Dept. of Biochemistry patrick.inns@bioch.ox.ac.uk The organisation and dynamics of major Escherichia coli outer membrane components
5.15pm Yanan Zhu, STRUBI yanan.zhu@strubi.ox.ac.uk In situ structure of Particulate Methane Monooxygenase (pMMO) arrays in native methanotrophs
5.30pm Beer and Pizza in the Common Room, Dept. of Plant Sciences

November 2021 (Michaelmas, by Zoom)

2pm Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
2pm Raphael Ledermann, Dept. of Plant Sciences raphael.ledermann@plants.ox.ac.uk  Polyamine-mediated acid tolerance is critical for bacteroid functioning.
2.15pm Syma Khalid, Dept. of Biochemistry syma.khalid@bioch.ox.ac.uk What can we learn about bacterial membranes from computer simulations?
2.45pm Jani Bolla, Dept. of Plant Sciences jani.bolla@plants.ox.ac.uk Towards a mechanistic understanding of Gram-negative bacterial cell envelope biogenesis.
3.15pm Gideon Mamou, Dept. of Biochemistry gideon.mamou@bioch.ox.ac.uk Peptidoglycan maturation shapes outer membrane protein biogenesis in E. coli.
3.30pm TEA BREAK
4pm Jacob Palmer, Dept. of Zoology jacob.palmer@zoo.ox.ac.uk The evolution of spectrum in antibiotics and bacteriocins.
4.15pm Owain Bryant, Dept. of Biochemistry owain.bryant@bioch.ox.ac.ukStructural studies of the TatBC complex of the twin-arginine protein transport system.
4.30pm Ravinash Krisha Kumar, Dept. of Chemistry ravinash.krishnakumar@chem.ox.ac.uk Bacterial competition in 3D-printed structured communities.
4.45pm Wearn Xin (Edeline) Yee, Sir William Dunn School of Pathology wearn.yee@merton.ox.ac.uk Resistance movement: Determining genetic factors impacting mobility of AMR plasmids in Neisseria gonorrhoeae.
5pm Divya Choudhary, Dept. of Biochemistry divya.choudhary@some.ox.ac.uk Spatio-temporal variation of oxidative stress response in E. coli.
5.15pm Jan Boehning, Sir William Dunn School of Pathologyjan.boehning@lincoln.ox.ac.uk  The structure of TasA fibres in Bacillus subtilis biofilms.

May 2021 (Trinity, by Zoom)

2pm Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
2pm Richard Berry, Dept. of Physics richard.berry@physics.ox.ac.uk Single-molecule investigations of the mechanism of the bacterial flagellar motor
2.30pm Liisa Veerus, Dept. of Zoology  liisaveerus@gmail.com  Evolutionary Implications of Reproductive Tract Microbiota in a Polygynandrous Host, the Red Junglefowl (Gallus gallus)
2.45pm Carolin Schulte, Dept. of Plant Sciences/Dept. of Engineering Science carolin.schulte@keble.ox.ac.uk  Metabolic control of nitrogen fixation in the rhizobium-legume symbioses
3pm TEA BREAK
3.15pm Pedro Moura Alves, Ludwig Cancer Institute pedro.mouraalves@ludwig.ox.ac.uk Spying on bacterial communication: AhR senses bacterial quorum and impacts on host defense mechanisms
3.45pm Hafez El Sayyed, Dept. of Physics hafez.elsayyed@physics.ox.ac.uk Studying NusG function in live bacteria using single-molecule tracking.
4pm Saran Davies, Dept. of Zoology saran.davies@jesus.ox.ac.ukPseudomonas aeruginosa Persister Cell Proportion is Highest During Exponential Growth
4.15pm Melissa Webby, Dept. of Biochemistry melissa.webby@bioch.ox.ac.ukOuter Membrane Protein Organisation in E. coli: What is the molecular basis of supramolecular island formation?
4.30pm Susan Black, STRUBI suzi@strubi.ox.ac.uk Mechanosensitive channels in E. coli

February 2021 (Hilary, by Zoom)

2pm Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
2pm Tim Walsh, Dept. of Zoology timothy.walsh@zoo.ox.ac.ukCOVID versus AMR – lessons we can learn
2.30pm Ronelle Roth, Dept. of Plant Sciences ronelle.roth@plants.ox.ac.uk Maintaining good relations: siRNA-mediated regulation of arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis in tomato
3pm TEA BREAK
3.15pm Charlotte Melia, Sir William Dunn School of Pathology charlotte.melia@path.ox.ac.uk In situ cryo-EM of Pseudomonas aeruginosa cell-cell junctions reveals a target for bacterial biofilm inhibition
3.30pm Laura Clark, Dept. of Plant Sciences laura.clark@plants.ox.ac.ukWhere should I invest my resources? How host plants regulate interactions with bacterial symbionts
3.45pm Harrison Steel, Dept. of Engineering Science harrison.steel@eng.ox.ac.uk Developing robotic tools that enable real-time control of biological experimentation
4pm Nathalie Reichmann, Dept. of Biochemistry nathalie.reichmann@bioch.ox.ac.uk   Complement-mediated killing: a bacterium’s point of view

No meetings were held in Trinity term 2020 or Michaelmas term 2020 due to COVID-19.

February 2020 (Hilary)

2pm Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
2pm Tanmay Bharat Sir William Dunn School of Pathology tanmay.bharat@path.ox.ac.uk Structural cell biology of prokaryotic surface layer proteins
2.30pm Pedro Moura Alves Ludwig Cancer Institute pedro.mouraalves@ludwig.ox.ac.uk Spying on bacterial quorum: infection dynamics under surveillance by the host AhR
3pm Paulo Bettencourt The Jenner Institute paulo.bettencourt@ndm.ox.ac.uk Identification of peptides presented by MHC for vaccines against tuberculosis
3.30pm Tea
4pm Chair: Judy Armitage (Dept. of Biochemistry)
4pm Sarah Hollingshead Sir William Dunn School of Pathology sarah.hollingshead@path.ox.ac.uk How to hold on to your plasmid
4.15pm Keith Cassidy Dept. of Biochemistry/STRUBI ckcassidy1@gmail.comStructure and dynamics of the E. coli chemotaxis core signalling complex
4.30pm Andrzej Tkacz Dept. of Plant Sciences andrzej.tkacz@plants.ox.ac.uk  A holistic approach to the plant microbiome
4.45pm Abul Tarafder Sir William Dunn School of Pathology abul.tarafder@path.ox.ac.uk  Phage liquid crystalline droplets encapsulate and protect bacteria
5pm New Starter Session: Lois Ogunlana Dept. of Zoology lois.ogunlana@balliol.ox.ac.uk Investigating the fitness effects of mobile colistin resistance genes
5.15pm New Starter Session: Anna Dewar Dept. of Zoology anna.dewar@wolfson.ox.ac.uk A comparative approach to understanding selection on extracellular secretion
5.30pm Pizza and beer in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room

May 2019 (Trinity)

2pm Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
2pm Kayla King kayla.king@zoo.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Zoology) Killers and protectors: rapid microbial evolution across the parasitism-mutualism continuum
2.30pm Valentine Legage valentine.lagage@bioch.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Biochemistry) Bacterial mutation dynamics in response to oxidative stress
3pm Tim Haskett tim.haskett@plants.ox.ac.uk  (Dept. of Plant Sciences) Controlling plant-microbe interactions with rhizopine signalling
3.30pm TEA in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room (area at the back reserved for us)
4pm Chair: Judy Armitage (Dept. of Biochemistry)
4pm Elisa Granato elisa.granato@zoo.ox.ac.uk (Dept. Of Zoology) Counter-attack at any cost: self-lysis in bacterial warfare
4.30pm Rafael Da Silva Custodio rafael.dasilvacustodio@path.ox.ac.uk (Dunn School of Pathology) Commensal Neisseria utilises a Type VI secretion system to kill N. meningitidis
5pm Oliver Meacock oliver.meacock@balliol.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Zoology) The tortoise and the hare: how collective behaviours within bacterial biofilms select for cells that move more slowly
5.15pm New Starter Session: Reza Rohani reza.rohani@eng.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Engineering) Vibrio natriegens as a chassis for synthetic biology
5.30pm Pizza and beer in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room

February 2019 (Hilary)

2pm Chair: Colin Kleanthous (Dept. of Biochemistry)
2pm Rut Caballido-López rut.carballido-lopez@inra.fr (Micalis Institute, Paris) Shaping bacteria: dynamics and morphogenetic function of actin-like MreB proteins
2.30pm Jim Naismith naismith@strubi.ox.ac.uk (STRUBI) Making hard molecules using bacterial enzymes
3pm Carmen Sanchez-Cañizares carmen.sanchez-canizares@plants.ox.ac.uk(Dept. of Plant Sciences) Control of bacterial nitrogen and carbon metabolism by a PTS-regulated switch
3.30pm TEA in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room (area at the back reserved for us)
Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
4pm Sandip Kumarsandip.kumar@bioch.ox.ac.uk(Dept. of Biochemistry) Imaging organization in the Escherichia coli outer membrane
4.30pm Helen Alexanderhelen.alexander@zoo.ox.ac.uk(Dept. of Zoology) Stochastic bacterial population dynamics prevent the emergence of antibiotic resistance
5pm Beatriz Jorrínbeatriz.jorrin@plants.ox.ac.uk(Dept. of Plant Sciences) Broad host range tool to label synthetic bacterial communities
5.20pm Pizza and beer in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room

October 2018 (Michaelmas)

2pm Judy Armitage (Dept. of Biochemistry) Short introduction/announcements
Chair: Ruth Cohen Khait (Dept. of Biochemistry)
2.10pm Peijun Zhang peijun@strubi.ox.ac.uk(STRUBI) Tales of Bacterial Chemosensory Arrays
2.40pm Hee-Jeon Hong hee-jeon.hong@brookes.ac.uk (Dept. of Biological and Medical Sciences, Oxford Brookes)Functional Genomics of Bioactive Secondary Metabolites in Actinomycetes
3.10pm Paul Rutten paul.rutten@biodtp.ox.ac.uk(Dept. of Plant Sciences) How does oxygen regulation prepare Rhizobium for life in nodules?
3.25pm Catherine Fan catherine.fan@wolfson.ox.ac.uk (IBME) Zombie Cells: a novel chassis for synthetic biology
3.40pm TEA in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room (area at the back reserved for us)
Chair: Judy Armitage (Dept. of Biochemistry)
4.10pm Keith Jolley keith.jolley@zoo.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Zoology) Open-access bacterial population genomics: PubMLST and the BIGSdb genomics platform
4.25pm Jamie Wheeler james.wheeler@linacre.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Zoology) How do bacteria navigate through developing biofilms?
4.40pm Stephan Uphoff stephan.uphoff@bioch.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Biochemistry) Imaging real-time dynamics of mutagenesis in single cells
5.10pm Takuya Machida takuya.machida@chem.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Chemistry) Tunicamycin analogues for developing new class of antibiotics
5.25pm Nattapong Sanguankiattichai nattapong.sanguankiattichai@biodtp.ox.ac.uk  (Dept. of Plant Sciences) Pseudomonas syringae produces an inhibitor of plant defence-related b-galactosidase
5.40pm Pizza and beer in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room

May 2018 (Trinity)

Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
2pm Wei Huang wei.huang@eng.ox.ac.uk(Dept. of Engineering) From single cell to synthetic biology
2.30pm Colin Kleanthous colin.kleanthous@bioch.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Biochemistry) Spatiotemporal organization of the bacterial outer membrane and its consequences
3pm Susan Lea susan.lea@path.ox.ac.uk(Dunn School of Pathology) Using structure to dissect function in bacteria-host interactions
3.30pm TEA in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room
Chair: Emma Sadler (Dept. of Biochemistry)
4pm Marcela Mendoza-Suárez marcela.mendozasuarez@plants.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Plant Sciences) Identifying competitive and effective rhizobial strains: Getting to the root of the problem
4.15pm Alex Orlek alex.orlek@wolfson.ox.ac.uk (Nuffield Department of Medicine) An in silico tool for comparative analysis of bacterial plasmids using high-throughput sequencing data
4.30pm Ana Cehovin ana.cehovin@path.ox.ac.uk  (Dunn School of Pathology) Novel Neisseria gonorrhoeae lineages with high prevalence of resistance plasmids: implications for plasmid maintenance
4.45pm Rachel Wheatley  rachel.wheatley@univ.ox.ac.uk  (Dept. of Plant Sciences) Fitness determinants in Rhizobium-legume symbioses
5pm Frederic Lauber frederic.lauber@bioch.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Biochemistry) and Justin Deme justin.deme@path.ox.ac.uk (Dunn School of Pathology) Structural studies of bacterial secretion systems
5.30pm Pizza and beer in Dept. of Plant Sciences Common Room

Feb 2018 (Hilary)

Chair: Philip Poole (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
2pm Renier van der Hoorn renier.vanderhoorn@plants.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Plant Sciences) Molecular dialogs at the plant-pathogen interface
2.30pm Christoph Tang christoph.tang@path.ox.ac.uk  (Dunn School of Pathology) Title TBC
3.pm Ian Thompson ian.thompson@eng.ox.ac.uk  (Dept. of Engineering) Engineering Microbial Communities
3.30pm TEA in Plant Sciences Dept. Common Room
Chair: Beatriz Jorrín (Dept. of Plant Sciences)
4pm Lindsay Baker lindsay@strubi.ox.ac.uk (STRUBI) Native Membrane Structural Biology:  A hybrid approach to study bacterial membrane proteins across resolutions in their native environment
4.15pm Vinoy Ramachandran vinoy.ramachandran@plants.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Plant Sciences) How rhizobia attach to and colonise legume roots
4.30pm Jun Fan jun.fan@physics.ox.ac.uk (Dept. of Physics) Super-resolution imaging of transcription organisation in different physiological states
4.45pm Daniel Unterweger daniel.unterweger@zoo.ox.ac.uk  (Dept. of Zoology) Bacterial warfare during chronic infection
5pm Marie-Louise Francis (Dept. of Biochemistry) marie-louise.francis@stx.ox.ac.uk Colicin translocation through the E. coli cell envelope
5.15pm Paulo Bettencourt paulo.bettencourt@ndm.ox.ac.uk (The Jenner Institute) Identification of Mycobacterial Antigens Presented by MHC Molecules from Infected Macrophages using Mass Spectrometry
5.35pm Pizza and beer in Plant Sciences Dept. Common Room