New post-doctoral research position in my phage-host interactions (Phi) laboratory in @otagomicroimmuno.bsky.social at @universityofotago.bsky.social New Zealand. The project is focused on defences against jumbo phages. Please share and if interested apply using the link in the comments.
04.03.2026 00:20 — 👍 28 🔁 28 💬 4 📌 0
A jumbo cyanophage encodes the most complete ribosomal protein set in the known virosphere www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
04.03.2026 03:43 — 👍 13 🔁 5 💬 0 📌 0Filament formation is a conserved mechanism of Thoeris SIR2 effector activation https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.03.01.708072v1
03.03.2026 02:17 — 👍 8 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
Ribosome centric perspective on the evolution of life. @mkrupovic.bsky.social and Eugene Koonin arxiv.org/abs/2602.23268
03.03.2026 08:23 — 👍 19 🔁 5 💬 0 📌 0
Like bacteria, phages use sRNAs to regulate gene expression! Out today in @cp-trendsmicrobiol.bsky.social, @mvelascogomariz.bsky.social and I highlight a recent RIL-seq study from the @saharmelamed.bsky.social lab that looked into posttranscriptional regulation of lambda!
tinyurl.com/lambda-RIL-seq
Cell death is a fundamental mechanism of antiviral immunity across diverse organisms, including bacteria. As my final PhD project with @jbdsf.bsky.social, I was curious whether cell death is required for successful immunity with the ancient cGAS pathway known as ‘CBASS.’
Spoiler – the answer is no!
A 5-hydroxymethylcytosine DNA glycosylase provides defense against T-even bacteriophages https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.02.25.707755v1
26.02.2026 05:18 — 👍 11 🔁 7 💬 0 📌 0
1/5
Happy by a recent biorxiv pre-print about DARNA (PD-T7-3) anti-phage defense system. This system is activated by binding to ssDNA, presented by phage SSB, to cleave tRNA in the anti-codon loop.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Viral SSB-bound ssDNA activates the bacterial anti-phage defense system DARNA https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.02.22.705581v1
24.02.2026 02:17 — 👍 6 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 0
The 2026 symposium on the immune system of bacteria, New York, May 5-7
A fantastic lineup of speakers, looking forward to seeing top unpublished discoveries on bacterial immunity
Very timely review; thank Alex Hong and @jbdsf.bsky.social for putting this together
journals.plos.org/plospathogen...
Max Fels @mfels.bsky.social from our lab discovers giant DNA viruses that infect amoeba encode eIF4E and the entire suite of 4F complex proteins to control mRNA translation, including beautiful crystal structures of viral 4E bound to modified mRNA 5' caps:
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
Congratulations to Sonomi Yamaguchi for her paper at @nature.com. Sonomi discovered Clover defense and explained how nucleotide signals control each step of viral sensing, immune regulation, and viral restriction – named for her beautiful "four-leaf" structures 🍀
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Bluesky is the new science Twitter, new study by @whysharksmatter.bsky.social and Julia Wester concludes!
"Results show that for every reported professional benefit that scientists once gained from Twitter, scientists can now gain that benefit more effectively on Bluesky than on Twitter."
Lokiarchaeon CBASS ❤️
14.02.2026 19:47 — 👍 17 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 0
And save >80% on the cost by pooling 6 or more plasmids into a single sample using our free SAVEMONEY algorithm!
elifesciences.org/articles/88794
colab.research.google.com/github/Masaa...
Molecular basis for anti-jumbo phage #immunity by AVAST type 5.
Avs5 detects an early jumbo‑phage activator and halts infection by rapidly hydrolyzing NAD+.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... #phage #bacteriophage #MicroSky
Aude Bernheim @audeber.bsky.social and Eugene Koonin discuss one of most interesting questions in the field connecting bacterial and animal immunity!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
BackToBack #PhageSky in @nature.com
A pore-forming antiphage defence is activated by oligomeric phage proteins
-from Maxwell & Norris
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Bacterial immune activation via supramolecular assembly with phage triggers
-from Laub & Ghanbarpour
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Thank you and thank you for your help:)
04.02.2026 09:54 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Chemical inhibition of a bacterial immune system
Small molecules inhibit type II Thoeris anti-phage systems from diverse bacteria. One compound, IP6C, improves phage-therapy against P. aeruginosa & is effective against Thoeris in polymicrobial communities
www.cell.com/cell-host-mi...
FoldMason is out now in @science.org. It generates accurate multiple structure alignments for thousands of protein structures in seconds. Great work by Cameron L. M. Gilchrist and @milot.bsky.social.
📄 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
🌐 search.foldseek.com/foldmason
💾 github.com/steineggerla...
Thank you Romi:)
29.01.2026 17:53 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0Thank you! It was a great pleasure to work with you on this project:)
29.01.2026 12:38 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0Thank you Avigail!
29.01.2026 12:37 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0Huge thanks to Rotem Sorek and everyone at @soreklab.bsky.social — especially @bhurieva.bsky.social , @dinahoch.bsky.social , and @erezyirmiya.bsky.social — and to M. Itkin and S. Malitsky
29.01.2026 11:20 — 👍 5 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Five years ago, NAD⁺ depletion wasn’t recognized as a bacterial immune strategy.
Now we know many systems do this: TIRs, SIRim, SEFIR, aRES, and the MisA effector of Metis www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1....
It’s amazing to watch this field grow.
aRES is an abundant defense strategy, found in 4% of bacteria. Its discovery further increases the fraction of bacteria that degrade NAD⁺ for phage defense.
This abundance results in the evolution of additional anti-defense genes, including a small phage protein that directly binds and inhibits aRES
This extended pathway — NARP1-AP — efficiently protects phages from aRES.
All three enzymes are required, and together they also protect against classic NAD-depleting systems like Nezha.
Digging deeper into NARP1 operons, we discovered an associated phosphatase gene.
This enzyme removes the phosphate from ADPR-1P, converting it back to ADPR — the canonical NARP1 substrate.
