Appen thas reet…

A remarkable paper. Davisson and colleagues describe an in vitro reaction running under plausible prebiotic conditions that efficiently and stereoselectively aminoacylates a model tRNA.

This suggests a path through which nature may have chosen L vs. D amino acids!

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

Bacterial type II topoisomerases cleave DNA in a species-specific manner The type II topoisomerases, gyrase and topoisomerase IV, are essential enzymes in nearly all bacteria and are the targets of fluoroquinolones, which are some of the most widely prescribed broad-spectr...

I've found that one of the best ways to resist attacks on science is to continue doing science. To that end, here's my new preprint studying the differences between type ii topoisomerases, some of the best targets for antibacterials, to help guide the development of new and better antibacterials 🧪

Just thinking about my September plans..
Anyone else..?
Just sayin...

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.

Charlie Mo: generic trade off in phage resistance leads to betalactam susceptibility and down-regulation of virulence genes in phage-resistant #MRSA strains #phages2025 🦠

elifesciences.org/articles/102...

Why we know vaccines work | Royal Society Vaccines have helped to control many diseases that caused widespread suffering in the past and they are likely to be our hope of controlling the Covid-19 pandemic. Charles Bangham, Professor of Immuno...

Vaccines have helped to control many diseases that caused widespread suffering in the past, and continue to do so to this day. Professor of Immunology Charles Bangham FRS explains why we know #vaccines work and why they are so effective: royalsociety.org/blog/2021/01...

I was delighted to @UHCW path labs today to give a talk on our works and perspective on b-lactam usage and discuss with Steven Montgomery-Laird and colleagues, future collaborations and interactions @WarwickLifeSci
@BMSatWarwick & Institute of Translational Medicine.

Time to rethink FEC before we are all...?

Today is World NTM awareness day (worldntmday.org) so timely to announce a collaboration between Professor Bavesh Kana at the University of the Witwatersrand. Charis Thompson in my lab works on a linkage between ST kinases and the control of peptidoglycan cross linking chemistry in NTMs.

Dr Gillett dons the ceremonial robes yesterday to get her degree certificate @uni-of-warwick.bsky.social Dr Cheng managed to look at the camera for a change..

Andrew Harvey former Warwick Biochemistry student and now Global Marketing Director @pfizer (boy did well..) came to @uniofwarwick to speak and inspire at the graduation ceremony for @WarwickLifeSci graduates. Great to see you again!

Phil Stansfeld and I played host to Dr Chandra Verma @ASTARsg former collegue of mine from @YSBL_York visits @WarwickLifeSci & @BMSatWarwick today to tell us about developments in the institute and research in his group.
If only he could stay longer for an international fiesta, old style !

I’m seeing LinkedIn posts from former Venatorx employees laid off of July 4th. Anyone know what’s going on?

SpoIIIL is a forespore factor required for efficient cell-cell signalling during Bacillus subtilis sporulation Author summary Bacterial endospores allow bacteria to survive stress, persist in the environment and seed new and recurring infections. Cell-cell signalling is a cornerstone of how bacteria develop in...

journals.plos.org/plosgenetics...

It was fun to have contributed to this nice work from @crodrigueslab.bsky.social

@HendoRelish might have something to say about this if they were on Bluesky ….

Govt ropes in innovators & startups to fight antimicrobial resistance. How the initiative will work Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms Thursday launched a ‘One Health AMR Challenge 2025’ in Bengaluru to support technologies tackling AMR.

India, through C-CAMP, has launched the #OneHealth #AMR Challenge 2025, to fund innovators and startups developing technologies to tackle AMR across human, animal, and environmental health. Supported by #ICARS, the initiative will help address the annual toll of AMR.
theprint.in/science/govt...

Another victory for Gibbet Hill Rovers, 1 - nil against statistics @WarwickLifeSci @warwickmed @uniofwarwick

Density animation generated using ChimeraX, using "cootmode" display settings from chimerax-trimmings.

Movie recorded thusly:

cofr showpivot false; movie record; rock y 30; wait 600; movie encode ~/Desktop/rock_movie_more.mp4 framerate 40; stop

Striking fear into the ropergroup today, I’m back in the lab!!!

Nice, I will read this one with a lot of interest!

FtsW protein-protein interactions visualized in live Staphylococcus aureus cells by FLIM-FRET The bacterial cell cycle relies on the coordinated and dynamic interactions between division proteins and those involved in peptidoglycan (PG) synthesis. However, visualizing these interactions in viv...

Check out this tour de force by Nils Meiresonne and colleagues, establishing FLIM-FRET as a reliable way to study protein interactions in live bacteria with spatiotemporal resolution! We open the door to exploring divisome protein interactions during cell division.

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

Today we say farewell and best of luck for the future as Dr Fran Gillett leaves the Ropergroup and @WarwickLifeSci after 8 years, undergrad through postdoc and goes off to industry. We will miss you Fran

Best of luck….

Molecular dissection of Class A PBP function uncovers novel features of the non-canonical Clostridioides difficile divisome complex https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.05.29.656762v1

Persuasive argument Dr Schaffer’s!

Wish I was going but @seamusholden.bsky.social will be flying the Warwick microbiology flag instead.

Pseudomonas aeruginosa: ecology, evolution, pathogenesis and antimicrobial susceptibility - Nature Reviews Microbiology Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a functionally versatile bacterium, a leading opportunistic human pathogen and a model organism in microbiology. In this Review, Letizia, Diggle and Whiteley discuss P. aerug...

Our new big review on Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Hope you enjoy reading it. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Microbiology royalty @WarwickLifeSci today, Professor Malcolm Winkler and Tiffany Tsui @IndianaUniv. Fantastic lecture on Pneumococcal PG biosynthesis.
Took them to the Blue Pig in Wolvey of course!

Discovery and chemical optimisation of a potent, Bi-cyclic antimicrobial inhibitor of Escherichia coli PBP3 Communications Biology - Discovery of a bicyclic peptide inhibitor of cell wall biosynthesis in the Enterobacterales demonstrates applicability of a modified phage display platform to antibiotic...

Beta-lactams covalently bind to Penicillin Binding Proteins and have been the mainstay of antimicrobial chemotherapy for decades.
In this new paper with colleagues @Bicycle_tx we show a new way to hit old targets: rdcu.be/eoaRI

Regulation of the essential peptidoglycan hydrolytic complex FtsEX-PcsB during Streptococcus pneumoniae cell division In the human commensal Gram-positive bacterial pathogen Streptococcus pneumoniae, the essential extracellular cell-division-associated peptidoglycan (PG) hydrolase PcsB interacts directly with the cyt...

latest from us "Regulation of the essential peptidoglycan hydrolytic complex FtsEX-PcsB during Streptococcus pneumoniae cell division"
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...