Molecular Microbiology News - ASM€¦ · Molecular Microbiology News Issue 2, ... so I enrolled for a PhD in haematology. Before I ... Thomas LC, Olma T, Kok J, ...

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Molecular Microbiology News Issue 2, December 2014

Parasitology & Tropical Medicine SIG is pleased to announce

Parasitology and Tropical Medicine Master Class 2015

In Perth on 6th – 7th March 2015 The PTM SIG (ASM & ACTM) is holding its Annual National Parasitology and Tropical Medicine workshop (Master Class) in Perth next year.

Venue: University of WA – Queen Elizabeth Medical Centre, E-learning suites The Master Class includes:

• Practical Laboratory Workshops Sessions • Seminars and hands-on laboratory sessions by experts • Interactive sessions and Quiz • Daily catering (lunch, morning and afternoon tea) • Discount registration for ASM, ACTM, AIMS, RCPA & ASID members • Master Class social evening

Who Should Attend:

• Laboratory Scientists/Technicians – Microbiology, Molecular • Consultants & Trainees - Clinical Microbiology, Infectious Diseases • Anyone interested in medical parasitology and tropical medicine

Details and how to register: website coming soon

Contacts: [email protected] or [email protected] or [email protected]

Despite my disbelief, the end of 2014 is upon us! Through the haze of end of year parties I hope all members are reflecting on a successful, exciting and rewarding 2014 and I wish you all happy holidays and a safe start to 2015. Congratulations to all those members who had success in the latest ARC and NHMRC funding rounds and best of luck to those preparing to throw their hat in the ring next year.

For this issue Professor Roy Robins-Browne agreed to participate in our first researcher profile story providing an insight into his illustrious career. I have also collated news from our state branches and again we have a great list of diverse new publications from our SIG members. I hope you enjoy the read and a big thank you to those who contributed to this edition. I again would like to encourage you all to participate in the development of this quarterly newsletter by submitting publications, awards, news and research stories to me at: [email protected]

Happy Holidays, Hayley Newton

Chair, Molecular Microbiology Special Interest Group, ASM

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Career Timeline 1972 – 1976: Pathology Registrar, University of the Witwaterstrand and the South African Institute for Medical Research, Johannesburg 1976 – 1979: Microbiologist and Lecturer, South African Institute for Medical Research, Johannesburg 1979 – 1980: Research Assistant Professor of Medicine, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore 1980 – 1981: Professor and Head of the Department of Microbiology, University of Natal, Durban 1982 – 1991: Reader/Associate Professor, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 1986 – present: Adjunct Professor of Medicine, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore 1991 – 1996: Associate Professor, Departments of Microbiology and Paediatrics, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 1996 – 1999: Professorial Associate/Professorial Fellow, Departments of Microbiology and Immunology and Paediatrics, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 1996 – present: Inaugural Professor/Director of Microbiological Research, Royal Children’s Hospital, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 1999 – present: Professor, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 2002 – present: Co-Leader, Infectious Disease and Microbiology Group, Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Melbourne

Researcher Profile: Professor Roy Robins-Browne

Prof Robins-Browne is one of Australia’s most esteemed microbiologists who has taught, supervised and mentored many molecular microbiologists who have passed through the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Melbourne. Throughout his career, Prof Robins-Browne has made major contributions to

microbiology and understanding the pathogenesis of bacterial infections, especially those causing diarrhoea in children in less-developed countries. The most recent addition to his long list of awards was the Rubbo Orator and Medalist at the 2014 Australian Society for Microbiology meeting in Melbourne. He took a moment out of his busy schedule to chat with me about his path of scientific discovery. o As a ten year old what did you want to “be when you grew up”?

By the time I was 10, I'd given up on my dreams of becoming a fireman or engine driver, and thought that being a teacher or someone who studied nature would be nice. I thought the latter was called a naturist, but later discovered this was someone who doesn't wear clothes.

o What lured you into a research career in microbiology? Interesting question. I was training to be a pathologist. When I started I thought I'd be a generalist and train in all branches of pathology. So I started in micro simply because they had a vacancy at the time, and then switched to haematology. Part of my training involved some research, which I really enjoyed, so I enrolled for a PhD in haematology. Before I started, however, my proposed supervisor found another job. There was no suitable replacement, so I asked my former boss in micro if I could do a PhD with him. If he hadn’t said yes, I wouldn’t be answering this question now.

o And what keeps you there? As scientists and academics we are incredibly privileged to receive public monies to test our pet theories. I value the freedom to plan and supervise my own program of work in areas that really interest me.

o What scientific questions still drive you? My research focus at present involves suppressing virulence as a new approach to antibacterial chemotherapy. I'm interested in seeing if this can have clinical applications.

o Who would you consider your significant scientific mentors? And what sort of advice/guidance did they provide for you? I have had numerous role models, both good and bad, who have influenced me, starting with some of my high school teachers. The most important lesson I learned from them was that anything worth doing is worth doing well. If you apply this philosophy to your research, you will trust your observations and not blame your tools for an unexpected result.

o What advice would you give to early career researchers who wish to pursue a career in academia? Find a challenging problem that interests you. Then engage one or more senior colleagues whom you respect and admire to help you tackle it. In these collaborations, be prepared to give more than you take. It will pay off in the long run.

o Have you got a favorite career moment that you would be happy to share? It's not exactly "a moment", but the best career move I made was to do a postdoc in the USA. It was a life-changing experience that led to friendships and collaborations that are still going strong more than 30 years later.

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MiM2014 Microbiology in Maleny

Queensland Branch of the Australian Society for Microbiology

The QLD branch of the ASM had its annual scientific meeting: Microbiology in Maleny (MiM2014) – at The Tranquil Park Resort in Maleny on Saturday 29th of November. This meeting was a full day of scientific symposia with presentations from students, early career and senior researchers, covering a broad range of microbiological and infectious diseases topics. The Geoff Simmons Memorial Lecture: “Multi drug resistance and cross-resistance in bacteria of animal origin”, was presented by Prof. Corinna Kehrenberg from the University of Veterinary Medicine in Hannover, Germany. In addition to the fabulous science that was presented, the meeting was also a great opportunity to interact with colleagues and the ASM QLD branch looks forward to seeing everyone at next years meeting.

Kate Seib (ASM QLD Branch Chair)

Victorian Branch: ASM BD Student Awards 2015

Calling all Victorian student members: ABSTRACTS NOW OPEN It’s a great way to attend next year’s ASM Annual Scientific Meeting in Canberra (12-15 July 2015)

Where: Monash University, Clayton Campus When: Tuesday 24th February 2015 Presentations: Competitors will deliver 12 minute presentations and receive 3 minutes of

question time Awards: Two major awards are available to help students attend the national ASM meeting.

Winners will receive:

• ASM BD Award – conference registration, an airfare and $300 towards the cost of accommodation and is awarded to the best student presenting research carried out as part of a PhD or Masters by Research

• Victorian ASM Branch Award - conference registration and $200 towards the cost of an airfare and is awarded to the best student presenting research carried out as part of a Masters by Coursework or an Honours degree

Further details (including application forms and instructions) can be obtained by emailing:

Karena Waller ([email protected])

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Recent Publications by SIG Members Butler CA, Dashper SG, Zhang L, Seers CA, Mitchell HL, Catmull DV, Glew MD, Heath JE, Tan Y, Khan HS, Reynolds EC, 2014. The Porphyromonas gingivalis ferric uptake regulator orthologue binds hemin and regulates hemin-responsive biofilm development. PLoS One 9(11):e111168. Carter GP, Larcombe S, Li L, Jayawardena D, Awad MM, Songer JG, Lyras D 2014 Expression of the large clostridial toxins is controlled by conserved regulatory mechanisms. Int J Med Microbiol 304(8):1147-1159. Cleverley RM, Barrett JR, Basle A, Bui NK, Hewitt L, Solovyova A, Xu ZQ, Daniel RA, Dixon NE, Harry EJ, Oakley AJ, Vollmer W, Lewis RJ, 2014. Structure and function of a spectrin-like regulator of bacterial cytokinesis. Nat Commun 5:5421. Cui B, Smooker PM, Rouch DA, Deighton MA, 2014. Enhancing DNA electro-transformation efficiency on a clinical Staphylococcus capitis isolate. J Microbiol Methods pii: S0167-7012(14)00327-3. Davies MR, Holden MT, Coupland P, Chen JH, Venturini C, Barnett TC, Zakour NL, Tse H, Dougan G, Yuen KY, Walker MJ, 2014. Emergence of scarlet fever Streptococcus pyogenes emm12 clones in Hong Kong is associated with toxin acquisition and multidrug resistance. Nat Genet doi: 10.1038/ng.3147. Ha CW, Lam YY, Holmes AJ, 2014. Mechanistic links between gut microbial community dynamics, microbial functions and metabolic health. World J Gastroenterol 20(44):16498-16517. Harper M, St Michael F, Steen JA, John M, Wright A, van Dorsten L, Vinogradoc E, Adler B, Cox AD, Boyce JD, 2014. Characterization of the lipopolysaccharide produced by Pasteurella multocida serovars 6, 7 and 16: Identification of lipopolysaccharide genotypes L4 and L8. Glycobiology pii: cwu110. Hazelton B, Thomas LC, Olma T, Kok J, O’Sullivan M, Chen SC, Iredell JR, 2014. Rapid and accurate direct antibiotic susceptibility testing of blood culture broths using MALDI Sepsityper combined with the BD Phoenix automated system. J Med Microbiol 63(Pt 12):1590-4. Hiscox TJ, Ohtani K, Shimizu T, Cheung JK, Rood JI 2014. Identification of a two-component signal transduction system that regulates maltose genes in Clostridium perfringens. Anaerobe 3:199-203 Hocking JS, Kong FY, Timms P, Huston WM, Tabrizi SN, 2014. Treatment of rectal Chlamydia infection may be more complicated than we originally thought. J Antimicrob Chemother pii: dku493 Holden KM, Browning GF, Noormohammadi AH, Markham P, Marenda MS, 2014. Avian pathogenic Escherichia coli deltatonB mutants are safe and protective live-attenuated vaccine candidates. Vet Microbiol 173(3-4):289-298. Jelocnik M, Walker E, Pannekoek Y, Ellem J, Timms P, Polkinghorne A, 2014. Evaluation of the relationship between Chlamydia pecorum sequence types and disease using a species-specific multi-locus sequence typing scheme (MLST). Vet Microbiol 174(1-2):214-22. Kennan RM, Gilhuus M, Frosth S, Seemann T, Dhungyel OP, Whittington RJ, Boyce JD, Powell DR, Aspan A, Jorgensen HJ, Bulach DM, Rood JI 2014 Genomic evidence for globally distributed, bimodal population in the ovine footrot pathogen Dichelobacter nodosus. MBio 5(5):e01821-14 Know J, Jadhav S, Sevior D, Agyekum A, Whipp M, Waring L, Iredell J, Palombo E, 2014. Phenotypic detection of carbapenemase-producing Enterobacteriaceae by use of matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time of flight mass spectrometry and the Carba NP test. J Clin Microbiol 52(11):4075-7. Kupz A, Bedoui S, Strugnell RA 2014. Cellular requirements for systemic control of Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium infections in mice. Infect Immun 82(12):4997-5004. Liu YC, Roujeinikova A, 2014. Expression, refolding, purification and crystallization of the sensory domain of the TlpC chemoreceptor from Helicobacter pylori for structural studies. Protein Expr Purif pii: S1046-5928(14)00264-2 Macesic N, Morrissey CO, Cheng AC, Spencer A, Peleg AY, 2014. Changing microbial epidemiology in hematopoietic stem cell transplant recipients: increasing resistance over a 9-year period. Transpl Infect Dis doi: 10.1111/tid.12298

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Mavromatis CH, Bokil NJ, Totsika M, Kakkanat A, Schaale K, Cannistraci CV, Ryu T, Beatson SA, Ulett GC, Schembri MA, Sweet MJ, Ravasi T, 2014. The co-transcriptome of uropathogenic Escherichia coil-infected mouse macrophages reveals new insights into host-pathogen interactions. Cell Microbiol doi: 10.1111/cmi.12397 McIver C.J. and Bell S.M. 2014. A novel approach to testing Neisseria meningitidis in small volumes of CSF by a real-time quantitative PCR assay. Australian Journal of Medical Science. 35: 42-47 McIver C.J., Bell S.M., Er N. 2014. Development of an internal amplification control system for a real-time PCR assay for detection of Neisseria meningitidis in CSF and EDTA blood. Pathology. 46:344-347. Omaleki L, Browning GF, Barber SR, Allen JL, Srikumaran S, Markham PF, 2014. Sequence diversity, cytotoxicity and antigenic similarities of the leukotoxin of isolates of Mannheimia species from mastitis in domestic sheep. Vet Microbiol 174(1-2):172-9. Pallett, MA, Berger, CN, Pearson, JS, Hartland, EL, Frankel, G, 2014. The type III secretion effector NleF of enteropathogenic Escherichia coli activates NF-κB early during infection. Infection and Immunity 82(11), 4878-4888. Partridge SR, Ginn AN, Wiklendt AM, Ellem J, Wong JS, Ingram P, Guy S, Garner S, Iredell JR, 2014. Emergence of blaKPC carbapenemase genes in Australia. Int J Antimicrob Agents pii: S0924-8579(14)00324-0. Rees MA, Kleifeld O, Crellin PK, Ho B, Stinear TP, Smith AI, Coppel RL, 2014. Proteomic characterization of a natural host-pathogen interaction: Repertoire of in vivo expressed bacterial and host surface-associated proteins. J Proteome Res Oct 30. Shen HH, Leyton DL, Shiota T, Belousoff MJ, Noinaj N, Lu J, Holt SA, Tab K, Selkrig J, Webb CT, Buchanan SK, Martin LL, Lithgow T 2014. Reconstitution of a nanomachine driving the assembly of proteins into bacterial outer membranes. 5:5078 Shewell LK, Harvey RM, Higgins MA, Day CJ, Hartley-Tassell LE, Chen AY, Gillen CM, James DB, Alonzo F 3rd, Torres VJ, Walker MJ, Paton AW, Paton JC, Jennings MP, 2014. The cholesterol-dependent cytolysins pneumolysin and streptolysin O require binding to red blood cell glycans for hemolytic activity. Proc Natl Acad Sci pii: 201412703. Sobinoff AP, Dando SJ, Redgrove KA, Sutherland JM, Stanger SJ, Armitage CW, Timms P, McLaughlin EA, Beagley KW, 2014. Chlamydia muridarum infection-induced destruction of male germ cells and sertoli cells is partially prevented by Chlamydia major outer membrane protein-specific immune CD4 cells. Biol Reprod pii: biolreprod.114.124180. Standish AJ, Whittall JJ, Morona R, 2014. Tyrosine phosphorylation enhances activity of pneumococcal autolysin LytA. Microbiology 160(Pt 12): 2745-54. Stevens K, Zaia A, Tawill S, Bates J, Hicks V, Whiley D, Limnios A, Lahra MM, Howden BP, 2014. Neisseria gonorrhoeae isolates with high-level resistance to azithromycin in Australia. J Antimicrob Chemother pii: dku490. Taylor KJ, Van TT, MacDonald SM, Meshnick SR, Fernley RT, Macreadie IG, Smooker PM, 2014. Immunization of mice with Plasmodium TCTP delays establishment of Plasmodium infection. Paratise Immunol doi: 10.1111/pim.12158 Vidor C, Awad M, Lyras D 2014. Antibiotic resistance, virulence factors and genetics of Clostridium sordellii. Res Microbiol pii: S0923-2508(14)00183-1. Waryah CB, Gogi-Tiwari J, Wells K, Costantino P, Al-Salami H, Sunagar R, Isloor S, Hegde N, Richmond P, Mukkur T, 2014. Serological versus molecular typing of surface-associated immune evading polysaccharide antigens-based phenotypes of Staphylococcus aureus. J Med Microbiol 63(Pt 11): 1427-31. Wijesurendra DS, Kanci A, Tivendale KA, Bacci B, Noormohammadi AH, Browning GF, Markham PF, 2014. Development of a Mycoplasma gallisepticum infection model in turkeys. Avian Pathol 28:1-25 Wong Fok Lung, T, Pearson, JS, Schuelein, R, Hartland, EL, 2014. The cell death response to enteropathogenic Escherichia coli infection. Cellular Microbiology 16(12), 1736-1745.

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  Zhang B, Kunde D and Tristram S 2014. Haemophilus haemolyticus is infrequently misidentified as Haemophilus influenza in diagnostic specimens in Australia. Diagn Microbiol Infect Dis 80(4), 272-273. Zhou F, Wang Q, Sintchenko V, Gilbert GL, O’Sullivan MV, Iredell JR, Dwyer DE, 2014. Use of the 5’ untranslated region and VP1 region to examine the molecular diversity in enterovirus B species. J Med Microbiol 63(Pt 10):1339-55.