About the project
Human-caused changes, such as antibiotic overuse and misuse, climate change and pollution are increasingly affecting the microbial life on Earth. This project will investigate genetic elements that control cellular processes enabling bacteria to withstand ever-changing conditions, including temperature fluctuations and antibiotic exposure, by utilizing bacteriology, single-cell and computational approaches.
The results of this project will not only help us better understand how to successfully combat bacterial diseases but will also give us insights of how accessory elements supercharge bacteria to adapt to new environments. This is an increasingly important topic in light of the evolutionary pressure posed by pollution and climate change.
Bacteria are remarkably effective at responding to the diverse environmental challenges they encounter. But what gives them this extraordinary adaptability?
This project will explore the flexibility encoded in the bacterial ‘accessory’ genome, which can equip bacteria with novel functions beyond their core genome. Despite advances in DNA sequencing, many accessory elements remain part of the bacterial genetic ‘dark matter,’ as we know little about the functions of the genes they encode. This knowledge gap makes it difficult to develop effective control strategies against disease-causing bacteria.
In this project, you will investigate how accessory systems function and how they rewire core bacterial regulatory networks to enhance survival in harsh environments and resistance to antimicrobial treatments.
As a PhD student, you will use a combination of:
- microbiology
- molecular biology
- time-lapse microscopy
- microfluidics
- flow cytometry
- bioinformatics
- genome analysis tools
Your research will focus on a set of antibiotic-resistant Escherichia coli strains, addressing key questions such as:
- How do accessory genetic systems enable bacteria to rapidly respond to environmental changes?
- How do these systems influence the formation of biofilms – stress-tolerant, 3D bacterial structures linked to persistent infections?
The insights gained from this project will not only help in developing new strategies to combat bacterial diseases but will also reveal how accessory elements accelerate bacterial adaptation, which is an increasingly important topic in the face of environmental pressures like pollution and climate change.
