#Gquadruplexes can form within fungal pathogens and represent new #antifungal targets ➡️ doi.org/10.1038/s443...

By G. Middleton, F. Mahamud, I. Storer, Z. Waller, S. Bidula & colleagues at @ucl.ac.uk & @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social

A big thank you to our funders too @acmedsci.bsky.social and @ukri.org

New paper from the Bidula Lab in collaboration with the Waller Lab.

We show that G-quadruplexes may be novel antifungal targets with new modes of action.

Paper below 👇

Congrats to Georgie and Fuad on their first papers and a big thank you to everyone involved. @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social

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We have a PhD position available in our lab together with Prof. Jon Todd to explore the unidentified roles of fungi in protecting the planet against climate change 🍄 ☀️

Deadline Jan 7th 2026 for an October 2026 start. Get in touch for more info!

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It was great! Played my favourites. Great energy from all the bands. Maybe next time! Hope you had a good conference and I'll see you soon.

Great way to end #ECFG17 with a metal gig the Academy! Great night watching Rivers of Nihil!

G-quadruplexes represent promising new targets to overcome multidrug-resistant fungal infections The growing emergence of antifungal resistance has prompted the identification of novel antifungal targets. G-quadruplexes (G4s), four-stranded secondary structures that form in DNA and RNA, have aris...

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

Forgot to link the pre-print!

5. Finally, we found that PhenDC3 could cause a structural shift in one of the cyp51A sequences to transition from a duplex towards an antiparallel/hybrid structure, whilst PDS did not have this effect. We predicted that this transition contributed to the increased inhibitory effects with PhenDC3.

4. G4s could form in the RNA of live fungi and PhenDC3 promoted this formation. We also identified the structural flexibility of DNA sequences taken from two genes implicated in drug resistance, cyp51A and cyp51B. These sequences could form duplex, hairpin, i-motif and G-quadruplex structures.

3. Notably, PhenDC3 could synergise with the antifungal amphotericin B, was protective in an in vivo infection model, and was well tolerated by primary human vascular cells. Conversely, PDS was found to be more cyto and genotoxic towards human cells.

2. PhenDC3 had a potent inhibitory effect on Aspergillus germination but also caused fungal spores to swell to a much larger size. It prevented fungal growth within 8 h of treatment and was fungistatic. PDS exerted it's inhibitory activity within 1 h and it was found to be fungicidal.

1. We found that the G4 ligands PhenDC3 and PDS could reduce the metabolism of pathogenic Aspergillus and Candida species. PhenDC3 was more active against Aspergilli whilst PDS was more active against Candida. Notably, PhenDC3 had increased inhibitory activity towards the pan azole-resistant fungi.

New pre-print from the Bidula and Waller Labs exploring G-quadruplexes as novel antifungal targets. Big thanks to all the authors and to @drzoewaller.bsky.social for their support. @norwichmicro.bsky.social @uniofeastanglia.bsky.social @ucldiscovery.bsky.social

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

Great day at #Asperfest presenting our work on G4s in Aspergillus. Be sure to catch both Issy and Georgie's posters tomorrow on the main programme, posters P1.605 and P1.610

Issy kept her cool in the face of a barrage of technical difficulties to give a great talk #asperfest @ecfg172025.bsky.social

Excited to be attending my first Asperfest and ECFG conference with the Bidula Lab! Thanks for having us @ecfg172025.bsky.social