Becca Satterwhite

Adaptation without Dominance in Pseudomonas syringae Pathovars - Microbial Ecology Understanding local adaptation of phytopathogens has significant practical and economic implications. The opportunistic pathogen Pseudomonas syringae exemplifies this challenge, causing regular epidem...

My PhD work with the inimitable Joy Bergelson looking at local adaptation in a super-cool generalist pathogen that nucleates ice and decimates your favorite crop plant 🌱 👾 🧬 Thrilled to see this out (& reminded by @vscooper.micropopbio.org to celebrate each win)!
link.springer.com/article/10.1...

My quote of the day

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.

Charles Darwin

This sounds like one of those days where putting on some music and committing to a deep clean seems oddly appealing 😂

It is widely accepted that #T6SS -mediated intoxication occurs only on solid surfaces, where prolonged cell-cell interactions are forced, and not in liquid environments. But is this generalization true? Our new preprint says it isn't. A 🧵 ...
biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
🦠

🤣🤣🤣

An Open Letter to Graduating PhDs in a Post-Federal Science World July 15, 2025

Not exactly advice I give, but I believe this period is shaping the next gen of scientific leaders with unique skillsets. I wrote a bit about it here: uncultured.carinilab.com/p/an-open-le...

Agar concentration affects the evolution of antibiotic resistance and population genomics in experimental populations Pseudomonas aeruginosa Bacteria live in a diversity of spatially structured environments, which can impact their evolutionary dynamics via local interactions and environmental variation. Spatial structure is expected to slo...

Of course, why wouldn't agar also impact AMR genes too. Everything's a variable, lol. Good preprint:

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

Marco Rubio is reportedly saying Maduro will stand trial in US courts.

Which means it’s now the US administration’s position that US courts can hold foreign presidents, but not the US president, accountable for crimes.

This year I skipped the stressful holiday visit with toxic family members and opted for doing child-safe science experiments with my best friend’s young children (under 5 years old). 10/10 highly recommend! Why are we not all making baking soda ‘volcanoes’ all the time

CATS: Canine Airport Therapy Squad

Bioinformatics is in shambles at the Denver airport’s acronym game

Can’t believe the whole country has to suffer through the return of Dickensian childhood diseases because the worst, most ignorant attention-demanders decided other people’s expertise makes them feel bad

OK, #bioinformatics folk. We have some (many many) reads from a metagenome. They have been binned into a bacterial genome. They have no matches to any known genome in any database. They code for "bacterial" genes. What are good triple-checks to do to argue that they are not, in fact, euk sequence?

I am recruiting graduate students to my genomics-focused lab in EEB at Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Please spread the word if you know any students with an interest in a computational focus to genomics research! evol.mcmaster.ca/brian/evoldi...

Elevated rates and biased spectra of mutations in anaerobically cultured lactic acid bacteria | mBio Despite Earth’s oxygen-free origins and the abundance of microorganisms that thrive without oxygen, little is known about the rates and patterns of mutations in anaerobic species. This study directly ...

Excited to share our latest paper led by Ph.D. Candidate, Owen Hale, titled Elevated rates and Biased Spectra of Mutations in Anaerobically Cultured Lactic Acid Bacteria out now in mBio!

journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

Epstein-Barr virus reprograms autoreactive B cells as antigen-presenting cells in systemic lupus erythematosus Epstein-Barr virus reprograms autoreactive B cells as antigen-presenting cells to promote pathogenic antinuclear T and B cell responses in lupus.

A new study provides evidence of a biological mechanism for how Epstein-Barr Virus (EBV) may trigger lupus.

EBV seems to reprogram B-cells at the beginning of a cascade that ultimately results in autoimmunity.

The authors mention that EBV is a cause of MS, and may be related to LongCOVID.

Excited to share some new work led by grad student Sophie Walton (w/ @petrovadmitri.bsky.social). We used in vitro gut communities to study how natural selection acts on strains of the same species as they compete within larger communities. Check out Sophie's thread below for details!

Arizona rep sits at a plain fold-up table outside of Mike Johnson's office. The Speaker of the House official plaque is behind her. Her sign says "Mike Johnson is starving families and gutting healthcare to cover up the Epstein Files: Change My Mind!"

Probably the most badass thing I've ever seen!

AZ Rep Yassamin Ansari has set up a table outside of Mike Johnson’s offical Speaker Of The House office with a "Mike Johnson is using the government shutdown to cover up the Epstein Files - Change My Mind" sign!! 😆

Waning immunity drives respiratory virus evolution and reinfection Abstract. Viruses differ in the number and types of host tissues in which they replicate. For example, systemically replicating viruses such as measles inf

Today on Club EvMed we enjoyed a super discussion with the authors of this important paper. Join us next time or enjoy the recording!

"Waning immunity drives respiratory virus evolution and reinfection" by Antia, Koelle & Bull

Club EvMed: sites.duke.edu/clubevmed/
academic.oup.com/emph/article...

Good evening from the Arctic!

That’s absolutely beautiful

Two PROTAC questions:

1) Does anyone know of a PROTAC for GFP (which could be used to degrade any GFP-tagged protein)?

2) Does anyone have experience with any of the available PROTACs for Halo (like HaloPROTAC3)?

Behold my seasonal culinary skills (and my 🐈‍⬛ who wants to share): monster mouths, ghostly bananas, and mummy pigs-in-a-blanket 🎃

Hey Yaniv Brandvain is not on Bluesky but his most recent biostats ebook is live ybrandvain.github.io/biostats/. His stats resources have been so helpful to me as I develop my own stats course, so check it out. Github repo here: github.com/ybrandvain/b...

Free, professional illustrations of research organisms! 🎨🐁🪼🧪

We compiled original vector/raster graphics of 70+ organisms & viruses into a CC0 library. All by @arcadiascience.com's Audrey Bell

Check it out & show us how you use them!
research.arcadiascience.com/pub/resource... #SciArt #OpenScience

We're excited to be recruiting an NIH funded postdoc to work in the Coop lab at UC Davis. We're specifically interested in candidates who are want to work at the intersection of human genetics, GWAS, and population genetics modeling. Please RT

Study: We're losing the war against drug-resistant infections faster than we thought Antimicrobial resistance is responsible for some 1.2 million deaths a year a year and contributes to millions more. Data in the new report shows that the problem is growing at an alarming rate.

Antimicrobial resistance is responsible for some 1.2 million deaths a year a year and contributes to millions more. Data in the new report shows that the problem is growing at an alarming rate. n.pr/3J0HVBC

Did you know that it only takes one spontaneous mutation in your bacterial culture to activate a phage, and trigger a subsequent cascade of bacterial/phage evolution? 🧪 Curious how you could detect similar events in your experiments? Check out Nanami’s work!

1/3 To those interested in microbial iron & metal transport: In 1992, the late JB Neilands (UCB), the pioneer in the study of Fe transport entrusted me with his collection of purified siderophores from a wide range of microbes—many of them unique chemical species that can no longer be reproduced

Lenski and Travisano with LTEE lines in incubator.

Ofria and Travisano, who is holding metal tray containing LTEE populations in their flasks.

Mike Travisano back at MSU to give EEB Distinguished Alumni Lecture on "The major consequences of micro-evolution"

Mike a key player in establishing #LTEE and microbial expt'l evolution more generally. Here we are with LTEE lines in the incubator & Mike holding y'day flasks w/ @ofria.bsky.social

New clues in how plant microbiomes protect against bacterial speck disease | Penn State University Bacterial speck is a common disease affecting tomatoes that can result in lower yields for growers. A new study led by researchers at Penn State gives new clues on how a plant’s microbiome can be used...

🌱🧬 Penn State’s @hockettlab.bsky.social and team discovered how tomato leaf microbiomes can suppress bacterial speck disease.

Xanthomonas & Pseudomonas → less disease → possible microbial tools to protect crops.

🔗 Read more: www.psu.edu/news/agricul...