Malcolm White

and not a hydrothermal vent in sight.

Giant bacteria!

Interesting papers just keep coming this summer!

A timely review - so many recent discoveries in this sphere!

Kiwa is a membrane-embedded defense supercomplex activated at phage attachment sites Zhang, Todeschini, and Wu et al. show that the bacterial defense system Kiwa senses phage attachment at the membrane and assembles a transmembrane complex that halts infection by blocking phage DNA re...

Thrilled to see our Kiwa story out today! A membrane-associated supercomplex that senses infection and blocks replication and transcription.

www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

Huge congratulations to Yi and Zhiying for bringing it home, to Thomas for starting us off, and to all the collaborators.

1/16 New pre-print from the Sternberg Lab!
We uncover how temperate phages can use RNA-guided transcription factors to remodel the flagellar composition of their bacterial host and enhance their fitness.
Find the preprint and full story here: tinyurl.com/mshwjd77

This work was led by Haotian Chi @haotianchi.bsky.social and Ville Hoikkala @villehoikkala.bsky.social at @uniofstandrews.bsky.social , funded by @erc.europa.eu

Next up from our lab - a ring nuclease with a novel fold which cleaves all cOA species involved in Type III CRISPR defence. It's also found in plasmid and phage genomes, where it presumably functions as an anti-CRISPR.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

New role for HTH DNA binding proteins - sequestering phage DNA!

The anti-DS proteins just keep coming. Bdi1/2 particularly intriguing given the broad specificity. TadIII-1 is more peptide than protein. Fascinating stuff.

📣 We're hiring! We have a 12-month vacancy for a Postdoctoral Research Fellow with skills in molecular microbiology. See the details and apply here: www.vacancies.st-andrews.ac.uk/Vacancies/W/...

Please share!

Jo Hobbs @hobbslabmicro.bsky.social has a 12 month Postdoc available on mechanisms of antibiotic tolerance. More details here: www.vacancies.st-andrews.ac.uk/Vacancies/W/...

SAM-AMP lyases in type III CRISPR defence Abstract. Type III CRISPR systems detect non-self RNA and activate the enzymatic Cas10 subunit, which generates nucleotide second messengers for activation

Here we show how the type III signalling molecule SAM-AMP is bound and degraded by a specialised lyase enzyme encoded in cellular and phage genomes. More great work by @haotianchi.bsky.social and the team. @uniofstandrews.bsky.social
academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

Inhibiting heme piracy by pathogenic Escherichia coli using de novo-designed proteins - Nature Communications Many pathogens encode transporters that extract heme directly from host proteins. In this study, the authors demonstrate the utility of de novo-designed proteins in understanding the mechanism behind ...

Excited to share our latest work using AI-designed proteins to block heme-piracy by E. coli. Published in @natcomms.nature.com. A team effort between my lab and the ‪‪@knottrna.bsky.social‬ ‬lab, with experimental work led by the talented @danielrfox.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

We made structural predictions of representatives of each #PHROG from #phage genomes, and put the whole lot online. You can browse through montages or go to your favourite phrog directly and download its PDB.

💻🧬 #phagesky

linsalrob.github.io/PHROG_struct...

Congratulations to Simon (and Jo - my former PhD student)!

It's been a great few days hosting Eugene Koonin in St Andrews @uniofstandrews.bsky.social , where he was awarded an honorary degree in recognition of his stellar contributions to molecular biology and comparative genomics. Here with @tatianadimitriu.bsky.social

Looking forward to reading this!

Very proud to have won the Faculty of Science Excellence in Doctoral Supervision Prize. Biggest thanks goes to my nominator @francescodb.bsky.social and the awesome letters of support from current and past group members that brought a tear to my eye. It's shared with every member Taylor lab member.

Me showing off my poster

Made it to Heidelberg for #EESMicrobiology @events.embl.org!
Find me at poster 240 and make to check out @annaolina.bsky.social & @alekseiagapov.bsky.social 's posters and @emgoodall.bsky.social 's talk to see everyone from the lab 😁

Happily representing @multidefence.bsky.social at the #EESMicrobiology in Heidelberg!
Come to my poster if interested in prophage-mediated phage defence!
Also don't miss @emgoodall.bsky.social's talk today, and @alekseiagapov.bsky.social and @davvi36.bsky.social posters!

As the top non-golfer, that is a fair assessment

#phagesky #microsky

New paper from our lab! Fabulous and brilliant @carlosalfonsog.bsky.social and @shimengjin.bsky.social, together with fantastic co-authors, show that the neuronal protein ELAV promotes biogenesis of circular RNAs in the brain. This happens through inhibition of forward ("classical") splicing.

Annual lab putting competition at the “Himalayas” (THE original mini-golf course). Congrats to Stephen McMahon who won the trophy

The @asm.org just released an outstanding report on what we know (and don't know!) about key steps in the origin of complex life. We brought together leading experts on the origin of life, eukaryogenesis, and multicellularity, then jointly wrote this report. Give it a read!

asm.org/reports/earl...

Very interesting and enjoyable meeting!

A US climate conspiracy has spread to Canada — and local politicians haven’t been warned Councillors have been left scrambling to warn their colleagues before more municipalities abandon their net-zero commitments, after conspiracy theories resurrected from the US Tea Party swamped their ...

This is what happens to Canadian democracy when you can take a decades-old US conspiracy theory and get a chatbot to reframe it as fiscal responsibility.

Edze Westra kills viruses @multidefence.bsky.social

Great to be in Manchester for the annual @multidefence.bsky.social meeting, with Luna and Simon!