2025 Conference Agenda

CONFERENCE SCHEDULE

Monday August 4  
12:00pm Registration Annex Room
4:45pm Opening Reception Tripp Commons
6:15pm Introductions and Sternberg Announcement Shannon Hall
6:30pm Keynote Address: Phenazines Facilitate an Extremely Low Power Maintenance Metabolism on Life’s Metabolic Edge

Dr. Dianne Newman

Shannon Hall
7:30pm-9:30pm Session I: Host Microbe Interactions

Session Chair: Becky Lamason

Shannon Hall
7:30pm Introduction to Session: Dissecting the cellular landscape of Rickettsia-host interactions Becky Lamason
8:00pm NO on biofilms: Nitric oxide promotes Vibrio cholerae biofilm dispersal and rapid development of motility Nathaniel Esteves
8:15pm Orthogonal cell division in Staphylococcus aureus ensures uniform distribution of surface proteins to evade host defenses Felix Ramos-Leon
8:30pm Clostridioides difficile uses host-derived glutathione as a source of cysteine during infection Anna Gregory
8:45pm Bacterium Acts as Toxin Sponge to Protect its Fungal Partner from Antifungal Compounds Alyssia Gonzalez
9:00pm Metabolic flexibility through nonredundant isoprenoid biosynthesis pathways in Mycobacterium marinum Christine Qabar
9:15pm Characterizing The Role Of Ethylene Signals On Nitrogen Fixation And Metabolic Adaptation In Azospirillum Brasilense Ishita Banerjee
9:30pm Late Night Drinks Sunset Lounge

 

Tuesday August 5  
8:00am Registration Annex Room
8:45am-10:20am Session II: Systems and Synthetic Biology

Session Chair: Bryan Davies

Shannon Hall
8:45am Introduction to Session: Microcin diversity and prevalence Bryan Davies
9:00am A dual-function microcin enables biofilm formation Mady Telford
9:15am A Parallel Cheminformatic and Directed Evolution Approach to Enzymatic Enhancement in Pseudomonas putida Tejas Navaratna
9:30am Two to Tango: RhlR Integrates Dual Inputs to Orchestrate Quorum Sensing Gene Regulation in Pseudomonas aeruginosa Jon Paczkowski
9:45am Asymmetric Localization of Ser/Thr Kinase Activity during Sporulation Yihan Wei
10:00am Engineering novel bacteriophage-based biotherapeutics to target antimicrobial-resistant pathogens Bryan Lenneman
10:15am Break Sunset Lounge
10:45am-12:00pm Session II Continued: Systems and Synthetic Biology

Session Chair: Byran Davies

Shannon Hall
10:45am A systematic approach to understanding and predicting phage-antibiotic interactions Xukang Shen
11:00am ppGpp Contributes to Long-term Refrigeration Tolerance Sarah Anderson
11:15am Redundant regulation via polyphosphate and the stringent response during cell growth and division. Christopher Hamm
11:30am Diverse bacterial pattern recognition receptors sense the conserved phage proteome Sofia Luengo-Woods
11:45am Klebsiella pneumoniae factors enhancing bacteremia have distinct contributions to macrophage-mediated, oxidative, and nitrosative stress resistance Caity Holmes
12:00pm Lunch and Mentoring Tables Tripp Commons
2:30pm Poster Session – Even Numbers 2nd & 4th Floors
5:00pm Dinner Tripp Commons
7:00pm-9:15pm Session III: Cell Biology and Cell Structure

Session Chair: Anthony Vecchiarelli

Shannon Hall
7:00pm Introduction to Session: Yes! Bacteria have organelles. How are they organized? Anthony Vecchiarelli
7:15pm The Role of Polyphosphate in Carboxysome Localization and Dynamics Claire Dudley
7:30pm Signal peptidase SpsB coordinates staphylococcal cell cycle, surface protein septal trafficking, and LTA synthesis Ran Zhang
7:45pm Coordination of Motility and Cell Division in Borrelia burgdorferi Philip Adams
8:00pm Mis-localization of PBPs in Staphylococcus aureus gdpP mutant contributes to β-lactam resistance and surface protein cross-wall trafficking Yaosheng Jia
8:15pm Cyclic enterobacterial common antigen biogenesis requires the interplay between linear ECA regulation and an uncharacterized function unique to WzzE Joseph Carr
8:30pm Structural modeling reveals the allosteric switch controlling the chitin utilization program of Vibrio cholerae Holly Anderson
8:45pm It’s in their RNA:

A-to-I mRNA editing is widespread and affects protein sequence and function in bacteria

Dan Bar Yaacov
9:00pm Conformational Dynamics of the Massive HflK/C Membrane Assembly Support Bacterial Recovery from Stress. Alireza Ghanbarpour
9:15pm Late Night Drinks Sunset Lounge

 

Wednesday August 6  
8:00am Registration Annex Room
8:45am-10:15am Session IV: Phages & CRISPR

Session Chair: Lanying Zeng

Shannon Hall
8:45am Introduction to Session: Single-cell studies of phage infection dynamics Lanying Zeng
9:15am Sternberg Awardee: Mechanisms of phage detection by bacterial innate immune proteins Tong Zhang
9:35am Bacteriophage infection drives loss of β-lactam resistance and virulence in methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus Charlie Mo
9:50am Mycobacteriophage TM4 requires XylR for successful infection in Mycobacterium smegmatis Annesha Adhikari
10:05am Characterising the role of PglZ in the BREX phage defense system Jennifer Readshaw
10:20am Break Sunset Lounge
10:45am-12:00pm Session IV Continued: Phages & CRISPR

Session Chair: Lanying Zeng

Shannon Hall
10:45am Sternberg Honorable Mention: Nicolas Keith
11:00am A new toxin-antitoxin system, StaIN, utilizes DNA repeat units to mediate antiphage defense Tori Boyle
11:15am Using Tn-seq to screen genes of the virulent cholera phage ICP1 Elizabeth Tan
11:30am A minimal CRISPR polymerase produces decoy cyclic nucleotides to detect phage anti-defense proteins Ashley Sullivan
11:45am Characterizing an N4-like phage that infects Caulobacter crescentus Maeve Mclaughlin
12:00pm Lunch Tripp Commons
2:30pm Poster Session – Odd Numbers 2nd & 4th Floors
5:00pm Dinner Tripp Commons
7:00pm-9:20pm Session V: Microbial Communities

Session Chair: Josephine Chandler

Shannon Hall
7:00pm Introduction to Session: From cooperation to conflict: Quorum sensing and interspecies interactions Josephine Chandler
7:15pm  Quorum sensing reprogramming alters cooperativity in Pseudomonas aeruginosa Blanca Rodriguez
7:30pm Streptococcal Natural Products Mediate Interspecies Competition with Gram-Positive Bacteria Ruth Isenberg
7:45pm Separation of Intact Viable Phages by Capillary Zone Electrophoresis for Improved Imaging, Recovery, and Host-Pair Discovery Elizabeth Chang
8:00pm Characterization of a M. luteus-produced class III lipolanthine with anti-Staphylococcus aureus properties. Flavia Costa
8:15pm Surface-mediated phage resistance increases susceptibility to interbacterial antagonism Chia-En Tsai
8:30pm A conserved nuclease facilitates environmental DNA uptake Rebecca Hinrichs
8:45pm Investigating the connection between amino acid utilization and antibiotic sensitivity in uropathogenic E. coli strains Travis LaGree
9:00pm Negative Frequency-Dependent Selection of Phage Weaponization in Biofilms Yixuan Peng
9:15pm Late Night Drinks Sunset Lounge

 

Thursday August 7  
8:00am Registration Annex Room
8:45am-10:45am Session VI: Stress Reponses

Session Chair: Matthew Cabeen

Shannon Hall
8:45am Introduction to Session: P. aeruginosa pyocins: careful control for costly competition Matthew Cabeen
9:15am Phage Infection Triggers Derepression of Bacterial Immunity to Enhance Defense Against Phage-Encoded Inhibitors Reid Oshiro
9:30am BR-bodies promote mRNA storage under stress, contributing to fitness during stress recovery Hadi Yassine
9:45am Analysis of stress-induced small proteins in Escherichia coli reveals a connection between distinct signaling systems Srujana Yadavalli
10:00am Modular small RNA drives the emergence of virulence traits and environmental trade-offs in Vibrio cholerae Salvador Almagro-Moreno
10:15am A bacterial immune system acts at the ribosome to defend against phage Christina Beck
10:30am Break Sunset Lounge
11:00am-12:00pm Session VI Continued: Stress Responses

Session Chair: Matthew Cabeen

Shannon Hall
11:00am Combining multiple stressors blocks bacterial migration and growth Anuradha Sharma
11:15am N-acetyltransferases required for iron uptake and aminoglycoside resistance promote virulence lipid production in M. marinum Bradley Jones
11:30am Spatio-Temporally Patterned and Regulated Cell Death in the Human Pathogen Vibrio cholerae Ameya Mashruwala
11:45am SspA is a Dynamic Transcription Factor in the E. coli DNA Damage & Cellular Stress Responses Thalia Sass
12:00pm Lunch and Mentoring Tables Tripp Commons
2:00pm-4:00pm Session VII: Chromosomes, Replication and Repair

Session Chair: Rodrigo Reyes

Shannon Hall
2:00pm Introduction to Session: Defining DNA replication initiation with live-cell single-molecule microscopy Rodrigo Reyes
2:30pm Replication Restart after UV in E. coli: Recombinational Repair of Stalled Forks Triggers Over-replication, Masked by New Initiations from the Origin Andrei Kuzminov
2:45pm (p)ppGpp drives stress-induced mutagenesis by inhibiting repair of oxidative DNA damage Leah McKinney
3:00pm Purine Nucleotides Regulate the Anti-phage Deoxycytidine Deaminase AvcD Micah Ferrell
3:15pm Natural Transformation Promotes Highly Mosaic Outcomes Independent of Mismatch Repair or Global Sequence Content Jonathan Lombardino
3:30pm Selective packaging of bacterial host DNA by a transposable phage Runhang Shu
3:45pm Just the Tip(N) of the iceberg: A novel role for a coil-coil rich membrane protein in centromere tethering Morgan Letzkus
4:30pm 5K Run Meet at Memorial Union Terrace
7:30pm Poster Session – All Posters 2nd & 4th Floors

 

Friday August 8  
8:00am Registration Annex Room
8:45am-10:15am Session VIII: Signaling and Gene Expression

Session Chair: Marie Elliot

Shannon Hall
8:45am Introduction to Session: Shutting it down: nucleoid-associated protein control of Streptomyces antibiotic production Marie Elliot
9:15am Two novel interacting proteins function to repress Streptomyces exploratory growth Christine Baglio 
9:30am Locus-specific identification of DNA-bound regulatory proteins in bacteria with CATNAPP Taylor Nye
9:45am Ribosomal protein bL27 reduces trans-translation activity in E. coli Divyasorubni Seerpatham
10:00am Mycobacterium tuberculosis RNA polymerase pausing and effects of NusG and NusA defined at genome-scale and in presence of R-loops Ezaz Ahmad
10:15am Break Sunset Lounge
10:40am-12:00pm Session VIII Continued: Signaling and Gene Expression

Session Chair: Marie Elliot

Shannon Hall
10:40am Sternberg Honorable Mention: Phage Mu Utilizes the Clamp for Late Gene Transcription Khang Ho
10:55am The small protein YceO is a regulator of the inner membrane protease RseP Rilee Zeinert
11:10am The (p)ppGpp Hydrolase NahA Increases Translation Inhibition Upon Induction of Alarmone Synthesis in Bacillus subtilis Kevin England
11:25am Catabolite Activator Protein (CAP) and quorum sensing co-regulate bioluminescence in Vibrio campbellii Chase Mullins
11:40am Sternberg Awardee: Promoter inversion and anti-termination control mechanisms regulating capsular polysaccharide biosynthesis in the human gut symbiote Bacteroides fragilis Jason Saba
12:00pm Lunch and Mentoring Tables: Tripp Commons
2:30-5:30pm Session IX: Microbiome and Genomics

Session Chair: John Brooks

Shannon Hall
2:30pm Introduction to Session: The microbiome directs spatially localized rhythms in innate immune functions John Brooks
2:45pm Microbiome-Dependent Regionalization of Epithelial Cell Gene Expression in the Large Intestine Ciara Sanders
3:00pm Hide and seek: large-scale genomic inversion enable phage evasion in a prevalent gut bacterial species Shenwei Zhang
3:15pm Single-Cell RNA Sequencing Reveals Heterogeneity in Pseudomonas aeruginosa Biofilms Nasibeh Arabameri
3:30pm A Structural Investigation of Starch Transport in Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron Michael Cadigan
3:45pm Ribosome Profiling Discovery of Unannotated Small Open Reading Frames in Pseudomonas Aeruginosa Mona Wu Orr
4:00pm A novel amidoligase post-translationally modifies fimbriae to drive virulence in Klebsiella pneumoniae Genevieve Dobihal
4:15pm Genome Organization of Rhizobium leguminosarum Emma Wiesler
4:30pm Tailocin-Mediated Killing and Resistance Are Modulated by Hypervariable Coding Region in Xenorhabdus bacteria Emmanuel Allwell
4:45pm Multifunctional sponge proteins inhibit various signaling-based bacterial immune systems Iana Fedorova
5:00pm Closing Remarks
5:30pm Closing Dinner Tripp Commons
7:30pm Late Night Drinks & Dance Party Tripp Commons