Ep 43: Vaughn Cooper & biofilms. Tigecycline resistance. Chromosomal Hybrids. Pneumococcal vaccine.
Coming in hot for this November month! Today we have with us Dr. Vaughn Cooper, professor and director of the Center for Evolutionary Biology and Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. Tune in to learn about his deep love for evolution, his background at the Lenski lab and his current work studying biofilms.
For the news section, we first bring you Jenny's recent paper looking at the evolution of resistance to tigecycline and then move onto a UAC paper on the evolution of chromosomal hybrids which result in enlarged chromosomes. For a change, this time we also talk about vaccines, covering a surveillance study looking at the effect of pneumococcal vaccines and COVID-19 on AMR. We finish up the news by mentioning two big things released this month: a follow-up to the report on global burden of AMR in 2019, this time with numbers on the WHO European Region, and a new WHO Fungal Priority Pathogen List. Buckle up, this episode covers a lot!
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Relevant links:
- Center for Evolutionary Biology and Medicine's website.
- Evolving STEM. Outreach project founded by Dr. Cooper.
- Evolutionary pathways to antibiotic resistance are dependent upon environmental structure and bacterial lifestyle. Relevant publication from Dr. Cooper's lab.
- Rampant prophage movement among transient competitors drives rapid adaptation during infection. Relevant publication from Dr. Cooper's lab.
- EvolvingSTEM: a microbial evolution-in-action curriculum that enhances learning of evolutionary biology and biotechnology. Relevant publication on outreach project.
Further Reading:
- Low levels of tetracyclines select for a mutation that prevents the evolution of high-level resistance to tigecycline. First article covered in the news.
- Evolution of Bacterial Interspecies Hybrids with Enlarged Chromosomes. Second article covered in the news.
- Strange Bedfellows: The Origin and Evolution of Bacterial Hybrids. Journal highlight on previous article.
- Effect of pneumococcal conjugate vaccines and SARS-CoV-2 on antimicrobial resistance and the emergence of Streptococcus pneumoniae serotypes with reduced susceptibility in Spain, 2004–20: a national surveillance study. Third paper covered in the news.
- The burden of bacterial antimicrobial resistance in the WHO European region in 2019: a cross-country systematic analysis. Follow-up on global burden of bacterial AMR on the GRAM project.
- WHO fungal priority pathogens list to guide research, development and public health action. New priority pathogen list report by the WHO.
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