Laura Suttenfield

Happy 38th birthday to the #LTEE!
#BOTD in 1988.
Keep on evolving!

#science #evolution #microbiology

Check out the latest from @cathyhernandez.bsky.social, where she shows that prophage activity underlies intraspecific variation in thermal tolerance AND evolutionary rescue in response to extreme temperature challenge.

This is one for prophage peeps and climate change peeps.

Excited to share a preprint of work from my postdoc with @paulturnerlab.bsky.social exploring how prophages can impact host thermal ecology and evolution. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Next one in a storm of preprints from our lab's amazing scientists.. Recent-ex-postdoc, #newPI @cathyhernandez.bsky.social studied thermal ecology of marine bacteria isolated near New Haven. Turns out, response of this bacterium to temperatures is shaped by prophages!

#phagesky #microsky

Cancer therapies exploit DNA repair defects to kill tumours. We asked whether the same logic could constrain antibiotic resistance evolution...

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

MENI is back! Join us in Dublin this August 2026 for our 3rd Meeting for Microbial Evolution in Ireland. We are delighted to have @rachelmwheatley.bsky.social @drrebeccajhall.bsky.social @jpjhall.bsky.social and @tweethinking.bsky.social join us as keynote speakers this year. miniurl.com/MENI

SFI External Professor Santiago Elena elected to the American Academy of Microbiology SFI External Professor Santiago Elena has been elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology, joining 62 other fellows in the class of 2026, each selected for their contributions in the ...

SFI’s Santiago Elena has been elected a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology.

He joins 62 fellows in the 2026 class. His work explores how RNA viruses adapt to hosts and manipulate cellular resources. Since joining SFI in 2008, he has organized several working groups on virus evolution.

I am seeking a postdoc to join my group at UCLA -- ideally the candidate would have some experience in either population genetics or microbes/microbiome (computational background needed). We have a range of projects and are happy to tailer to your interests. Please dm/email me if interested.

Co-occurrence is associated with horizontal gene transfer across marine bacteria independent of phylogeny Abstract. Understanding the drivers and consequences of horizontal gene transfer (HGT) is a key goal of microbial evolution research. Although co-occurring

Now out & nicely formatted in @isme-microbes.bsky.social

A big analysis of ocean genomes & metagenomes co-led by former postdocs, now PIs, @gmdouglas.bsky.social & @cyanophage.bsky.social along with co-PIs @lbobay.bsky.social & Samuel Chaffron.

A few highlights... 🧵 (1/n)

doi.org/10.1093/isme...

congrats all! 🤩 🦠

The hidden energy cost of cellular dormancy Many organisms survive harsh environments by switching into special survival modes. Some bacteria do this by forming spores—dormant, highly resilient cells that can persist for years or even centuries...

www.growkudos.com/publications...

New work with @ckarakoc.bsky.social and @shoestrapped.bsky.social in @pnas.org

Congrats Lily! 👏

Our new paper and associated blog post were published today! And @biancanogr.bsky.social and @diemq.bsky.social finally made bsky accounts so I could tag them.

This is Bianca's paper from our lab and DiemQuynh's first ever.

I'm so happy to have this review out finally!

Accelerated evolution in networked metapopulations of Pseudomonas aeruginosa Centralized migration accelerates adaptation and drives parallel evolution, emphasizing the key influence of spatial organization on evolutionary dynamics across systems from pathogen transmission to ...

Quickening the pace (of evolution). Spatial structure speeds up adaptation to antibiotics. Great work by Partha Chakraborty just out: doi.org/10.7554/eLif...

PlasAnn: a curated plasmid-specific database and annotation pipeline for standardized gene and function analysis Abstract. Conjugative plasmids are key drivers of bacterial adaptation, enabling the horizontal transfer of accessory genes within and across diverse micro

Big week: welcomed a new baby boy Harris Lopatkin, AND our PlasAnn paper is finally out: academic.oup.com/nar/article/... (obviously the first more important than the second 🥰). Currently on leave but if anyone has the need to annotate large plasmids, go check it out!

Interested in eco-evolutionary feedbacks? Microbial experimental evolution? Pleiotropy? Filamentous phages??

Check out our latest preprint, now up on BioRxiv!

biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

For a quick summary, peep the thread below...🧵 (1/10)

Congrats to @noahhoupt.bsky.social for this massive effort (1000 generation!) evolution experiment demonstrating the importance of organism-derived environmental modifications in shaping adaptive evolution. A great example of how bacterial evolution only makes sense in the light of phage :)

Screenshot from GRC portal confirming microbial population biology meeting June 27, 2027 in Andover, New Hampshire.

It’s officially happening folks! The Microbial Population Biology Gordon Research Conference is back in Andover, New Hampshire starting June 27th of 2027!
See you there!!

@wcratcliff.bsky.social @ksbakes.bsky.social @surtlab.bsky.social

#microsky #mevosky

Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) | Biofilm Research Center | Binghamton University

Summer REU in biofilms! Pls share.
www.binghamton.edu/centers/biof...

Thank you!

New preprint from my lab (with Arya Kaul, @fernpizza.bsky.social, and @brinda.eu), in which we explore new genes hitchhiking on the beneficial deletion that fused them together, and find them in the LTEE, M. Tb/bovis, and across the bacterial tree of life

GitHub - baymlab/deletion-born-fusion-manuscript Contribute to baymlab/deletion-born-fusion-manuscript development by creating an account on GitHub.

💻 github.com/baymlab/deletion-born-fusion-manuscript
🔧 github.com/aryakaul/prefixsuffix-kmer
Many thanks to co-authors @fernpizza.bsky.social , @brinda.eu & @baym.lol + GenScale/Baym lab! Funded by NIH, Packard, Pew, Sloan & a Chateaubriand Fellowship!

Arya (my best friend) does not have social media, he asked me to tweet this for him. But if you want to chat about science (or offer him a job) you can contact him at arya.casa/contact. He’ll (probably) be defending soon!

🎉 New year, NEW PREPRINT!

Bacteria exhibit astonishing genetic diversity, but where do new genes come from?

My best friend Arya Kaul (/labmate in the @baym lab) investigates how advantageous deletions can spawn new genes - "deletion-born fusions." 🧵:

Thank you Michael! I'm excited for all the plasmid stories to come :)

Thank you Harshali! :)

Provirus induction diversifies adaptive variation in Pseudomonas aeruginosa lysogen populations https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.01.04.697566v1

Provirus induction diversifies adaptive variation in Pseudomonas aeruginosa lysogen populations Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a Gram-negative opportunistic pathogen that forms chronic infections in people with cystic fibrosis. Often P. aeruginosa strains are lysogens, infected with proviruses, that ...

Happy new year! The second big project of my PhD in Rachel Whitaker's lab is now up! 🎉 We look at how provirus infection affects the evolution of the bacterial chromosome with different types of viral induction – with CRISPRs or antibiotics. Take a peek 🦠 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Happy to see @joelrc.bsky.social's paper identifying cellular heterogeneity in basal OASL expression as a major determinant of interferon induction during influenza virus infection out in its final form:

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

Happy new year, hope everyone's 2026 is better than 2025!