Aditya Kamat

Versatile NTP recognition and domain fusions expand the functional repertoire of the ParB-CTPase fold beyond chromosome segregation | PNAS Nucleotide triphosphate (NTP)-dependent molecular switches regulate essential cellular processes by cycling between active and inactive states thro...

Now published. Thank you very much to our collaborative team, and very supportive editors and reviewers!!!

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Chromosomal Topological Domain Formation Modulates Transcription and the Coupling of Neighboring Genes in Escherichia coli Chromosomal topology and transcription are tightly coupled, yet the quantitative impact of topological constraints on transcription, supercoiling, and the potential coupling between neighboring genes ...

‘Chromosomal Topological Domain Formation Modulates Transcription and the Coupling of Neighboring Genes in Escherichia coli‘ by Drs. Nico Yehya, Christopher Bohrer, and collaborators, is now available on bioRxiv. Check it out! doi: doi.org/10.1101/2025...

Assembly, architecture and functional roles of microbial surface layers - Nature Reviews Microbiology Surface layers (S-layers) are ubiquitous protein assemblies that coat prokaryotic cells, with their functional roles increasingly coming into focus. In this Review, Isbilir and colleagues discuss rece...

Assembly, architecture and functional roles of microbial surface layers

Review article published in @natrevmicro.nature.com with @bupbuse.bsky.social, Andriko von Kügelgen and @vikramalva.bsky.social.

S-layers are everywhere!

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

Thrilled to share our multidisiplinary work on how genome-wide DNA bridging by H-NS reshapes the stationary phase bacterial nucleoid and affects the transcriptional landscape. With Xindan Wang and @meyerroc.bsky.social
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Versatile NTP recognition and domain fusions expand the functional repertoire of the ParB-CTPase fold beyond chromosome segregation Nucleotide triphosphate (NTP)-dependent molecular switches regulate essential cellular processes by cycling between active and inactive states through nucleotide binding and hydrolysis. These mechanis...

new preprint from our group & Antoine Hocher: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
A fantastic collaboration with Antoine, with Jovana Kaljevic' initiated the collaboration and drives the project.

Independent research fellowships leading to tenured positions at the John Innes Centre.

Repost = nice. Thank you very much!!!

two men are standing next to each other and one of them is saying `` you wanna hang out shoot the breeze '' ALT: two men are standing next to each other and one of them is saying `` you wanna hang out shoot the breeze ''

🚨🚨🚨Calling all Caulophiles and Alpha aficionados - stayed tuned for a virtual CauloCon in early 2026. And HOPEFULLY an in person alpha meeting in 2027!! DM me or @chienlab.bsky.social w questions or to stay in the know.

Expanding the genetic toolbox of the obligate predatory bacterium Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus with inducible gene expression and CRISPR interference Inducible gene expression and CRISPR interference-mediated depletion in the predatory bacterium Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus.

🚨New paper out! #MicroSky
Studying obligate predators like Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus is tricky—essential genes for predation are also essential for survival.
We expanded its genetic toolbox:
🧬promoters to fine-tune expression
🧬IPTG-inducible system
🧬CRISPRi for rapid knockdown
bit.ly/46GUn2c
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N6-methyladenine modification of DNA enhances RecA-mediated homologous recombination | PNAS Both DNA methylation and homologous recombination (HR) are extensively studied. In bacteria, Dam methylation is the most studied DNA modification, ...

N6-methyladenine modification of DNA enhances RecA-mediated homologous recombination

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

🚨 Imagine a bacterium that refuses to follow the textbook:
It grows as tangled filaments, divides unevenly, reshapes its own membranes… and even builds grappling hooks.
Meet Litorilinea aerophila — and here’s why it blew our minds.

Biophysics enthusiasts, do consider applying for the seventh session of YBM! Submit your abstracts by 20th August.

Strategies and mechanisms of contact-dependent predation in bacteria Predatory bacteria kill other bacteria to acquire nutrients. Among diverse strategies to kill and feed on prey, contact-dependent predation stands out…

#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...

And the story is published now!🍾
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Open access link: rdcu.be/exnOc

Many years in the making, great collaboration with @archaellum.bsky.social & @tunglejic.bsky.social

Thanks @ukri.org BBSRC & @leverhulme.ac.uk for funding, reviewers & editor!! 🙏
#microsky #archaeasky

Theoretical physics enthusiasts, do consider submitting an abstract for the upcoming sixth YBM!

Submit your abstracts here: t.co/W1qGraRpAc

Bacteriophage infection drives loss of β-lactam resistance in methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus In methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, evolution of bacteriophage resistance causes trade-offs that re-sensitize the bacteriato β-lactam antibiotics.

In @elife.bsky.social: Bacteriophage infection drives loss of β-lactam resistance in methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus doi.org/10.7554/eLif...

Function and firing of the Streptomyces coelicolor contractile injection system requires the membrane protein CisA CryoEM, genetic, and cell biological analyses reveal that the conserved membrane protein CisA mediates membrane recruitment of contractile injection systems Streptomyces coelicolor, enabling their act...

Happy to see our collaborative work on the contractile injection system (CIS) in Streptomyces published. We show that the membrane protein CisA gives Streptomyces CIS a licence to kill.
@pilhoferlab.bsky.social & Bastien Casu, @joesallmen.bsky.social #MicroSky

elifesciences.org/articles/104...

The fifth session of YBM is coming up next week. Join us for two exciting talks on Monday (7th July) at 11am (EDT).

Mark your calendars🗓️: tinyurl.com/29b7yk47
Meeting link: shorturl.at/0ng5A

Expanding the diversity of bacterial DNA partitioning: A CTP-independent ParABS system for plasmid partitioning in Streptomyces | PNAS The ATP- and CTP-dependent ParA-ParB-parS segrosome is a macromolecular complex that segregates chromosomes/plasmids in most bacterial species. CTP...

Finally published! Many thanks to the reviewers and editor whose comments & suggestions improved this work significantly more than the first preprint version!!!

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Bacteriophages target membrane-anchored glycopolymers to promote host cell lysis and progeny release Most bacteriophages lyse their host cell to release progeny virions. Double-stranded DNA phages typically promote host lysis using a holin-endolysin system. Holins form pores in the cytoplasmic membra...

The excitement continues! Check out my latest preprint examining how phages have adapted to lyse different bacterial envelopes. I found a lysis gene (lysZ) that is conserved in phages that infect corynebacteria mycobacteria, and other actinos.

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

I'm pleased to announce that I will be starting my lab as an Assistant Professor at UMass Chan Medical School in August! My group will study phages that infect corynebacteria and mycobacteria to understand bacterial cell envelope assembly and phage gene function. Website and more info to come soon!

#PhDone! 🎓 Congratulations Dr Shivangi Verma! 🎊
@shivangiv10.bsky.social from Prof Vatsala Thirumalai's lab successfully defended her thesis!

🧵👇Check out the thread to learn more about her work on understanding how neuronal networks are sculpted in the cerebellum during development 🧠

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Cyclic-di-AMP modulates cellular turgor in response to defects in bacterial cell wall synthesis - Nature Microbiology Brogan et al. uncover a signalling pathway in which levels of the nucleotide second messenger c-di-AMP increase in response to defects in cell wall synthesis. This regulatory pathway decreases turgor ...

Very happy to share that a large part of my thesis work is out today: B. subtilis uses the second messenger c-di-AMP to modulate its turgor pressure in response to the state of its cell envelope. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Multi-omics profiling reveals atypical sugar utilization and identifies a key membrane composition regulator in Streptococcus pneumoniae The human body comprises many different microenvironments, each with their own challenges for microorganisms to overcome in order to survive, and possibly cause infection. The human pathogen Streptoco...

Some positive news in troubled times: New preprint by Vincent de Bakker, Xue Liu @jonbakerlab.bsky.social Infection-mimicking conditions+transcriptomics/proteomics/'essentialomics'/lipidomics shows many cool things!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Join us at the BPS Thematic Meeting on Spatial Organizations of Biological Functions in beautiful Bangalore, India! The early registration deadline is July 21st, 2025. www.biophysics.org/meetings-eve...

How does your favorite species elongate? 🧵 "Phenotypic plasticity in bacterial elongation among closely related species". Happy to see this paper in print @natcomms.nature.com. Nice work by @mariedelaby.bsky.social, Liu Yang et al. See original 🧵, different colours, same data and conclusions.

Starting in 15 minutes...

🚨 Very excited to finally say… 🚨

The story of Noodlococcus - the contaminant that started ContamClub - is available to read 📖🍜🦠

Check it out ➡️ doi.org/10.1101/2025...

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Emergent universal long-range structure in random-organizing systems Self-organization through noisy interactions is ubiquitous across physics, mathematics, and machine learning, yet how long-range structure emerges from local noisy dynamics remains poorly understood. ...

🚀 Satyam and Guanming’s “Emergent Universal Long Range Structure in Random-Organizing Systems” shows noise correlations create long-range structure, from 🧩 hyperuniform materials to 🤖 ML, and that SGD’s flat minima bias is universal. 👇 arxiv.org/abs/2505.22933 #SoftMatter #ML

The interplay of membrane tension and FtsZ filament condensation on the initiation and progression of cell division in B. subtilis The first step of cell division is deforming the planar cell membrane inward towards the cytoplasm. As deforming membranes is energetically costly, biology has developed various protein systems to acc...

I’m excited that the work by Diego Ramirez and Lei Yin is out, where they gained several key insights into what provides the force underlying bacterial cell division doi.org/10.1101/2025....

To divide, cells must first bend the membrane inward, a process that’s energetically expensive

Deadline to apply is just around the corner!