Amelia McKitterick

🚨Preprint alert - this is a big one! We transfer the revolutionary power of TnSeq to bacteriophages.

Our HIDEN-SEQ links the "dark matter" genes of your favorite phage to any selectable phenotype, guiding the path from fun observations to molecular mechanisms.

A thread 1/8

We are hiring new a Tenure-track Assistant/Associate Professor in my division at UMKC! If you are interested, please apply by going to the link below and searching for Job ID 55628. It is a really wonderful place to live and work!

erecruit.umsystem.edu/psc/tamext/K...

This model parallels phages that infect Gram- hosts, which require spanins to overcome the structural barrier of the OM caused by LPS interactions. More work to come on the LysZ mechanism of action and functions of other cryptic lysis genes in coryne and mycobacteriophages!🕵️‍♀️

LysZ in corynephages was found to be required for efficient lysis in the presence of lipomannan and lipoarabinomannan, suggesting that these glycolipids contribute to making the inner membrane a structural barrier.

Bacteriophages target membrane-anchored glycopolymers to promote host cell lysis and progeny release Most bacteriophages lyse their host cell to release progeny virions. Double-stranded DNA phages typically promote host lysis using a holin-endolysin system. Holins form pores in the cytoplasmic membra...

The excitement continues! Check out my latest preprint examining how phages have adapted to lyse different bacterial envelopes. I found a lysis gene (lysZ) that is conserved in phages that infect corynebacteria mycobacteria, and other actinos.

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

I'm pleased to announce that I will be starting my lab as an Assistant Professor at UMass Chan Medical School in August! My group will study phages that infect corynebacteria and mycobacteria to understand bacterial cell envelope assembly and phage gene function. Website and more info to come soon!

🚨👉 Please check our recent work on bacterial cell division. In situ Cryo-ET reveals the cellular function of the penicillin binding protein 1b supported by AFM, live-cell imaging, in silico AlphaFold proteome screen and TIRFM. Hope you enjoy the read! #teamtomo #cryo-ET ❄️🔬🐎 big thanks to the team!

Intracellular competition shapes plasmid population dynamics Conflicts between levels of biological organization are central to evolution, from populations of multicellular organisms to selfish genetic elements in microbes. Plasmids are extrachromosomal, self-r...

I'm so happy that I can finally share the results of my first postdoc paper with @baym.lol!!! Turns out plasmids are an amazing system to study multi-scale evolution and we can track within-cell and between-cell dynamics!
(1/n) www.biorxiv.org/content/earl...

Combinatorial phenotypic landscape enables bacterial resistance to phage infection Success of phage therapies is limited by bacterial defenses against phages. While a large variety of anti-phage defense mechanisms has been characterized, how expression of these systems is distribute...

How can single-cell transcriptomics profile phage infection in individual microbial cells? Check out our preprint with Anika Gupta, Norma Morella, Dmitry Sutormin & other authors, in collaboration with Georg Seelig (UW) and Neel Dey (Fred Hutch). www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...