Antonia Sagona
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antoniasagona.bsky.social
Antonia Sagona
@antoniasagona.bsky.social
270 followers 270 following 15 posts
Reader (Associate Professor) in School of Life Sciences, University of Warwick, UK.

Interested in bacteriophages and phage therapy.
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
jessicamablair.bsky.social
Really excited to say that we have been awarded a BBSRC sLola! Really looking forward to kick off this project with such a fantastic team! @webberma.bsky.social @overtonlab.bsky.social @bugsinblood.bsky.social Sara Jabbari, Dong-Hyun Kim @imibirmingham.bsky.social www.ukri.org/news/powerin...
Powering team science to unlock life’s secrets
Four world-class teams awarded major BBSRC sLoLa grants to push the frontiers of discovery in microbiology, photosynthesis, gene regulation and quantum biology.
www.ukri.org
November 18, 2025 at 9:48 AM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
emmseveri.bsky.social
Interesting CRISPRi screening in Smeg to identify factors modulating resistance to antimicrobials (new insights into the role of the cell envelope)
November 16, 2025 at 1:41 PM
antoniasagona.bsky.social
Many congratulations one more time for an excellent viva! @tosinorababa.bsky.social Fantastic work!!
tosinorababa.bsky.social Tosin Q. Orababa @tosinorababa.bsky.social · 25d
Excited to share that I passed my PhD viva today. Many thanks to my Supervisors (@friendlymicrobe.bsky.social and @correlab.bsky.social) and examiners (@antoniasagona.bsky.social and Dr Cassandra Quave), and to all members of the Harrison lab 😊.
friendlymicrobe.bsky.social Freya Harrison @friendlymicrobe.bsky.social · 25d
#PhDone! Congratulations to Dr @tosinorababa.bsky.social, who passed his viva today 🎉
November 14, 2025 at 7:26 AM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
correlab.bsky.social
Very happy to have been involved in the discovery of “pre-methylenomycin C lactone”, a promising new antibiotic from Streptomyces bacteria - #JACS
warwick.ac.uk/news/pressre...
October 28, 2025 at 11:53 AM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
friendlymicrobe.bsky.social
#PhDone! Congratulations to Dr @tosinorababa.bsky.social, who passed his viva today 🎉
A group of people at a restaurant table
November 13, 2025 at 6:36 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
aharms485.bsky.social
Fantastic paper by James Bean and colleagues on phage Bas63 - this has been one of the first phages I ever isolated just for fun as a PhD student (in 2012!). It's #2 on this plate of Rhine river water on an E.coli K-12 lawn....

How it started /// How it's going
November 13, 2025 at 3:25 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
emmseveri.bsky.social
#microsky #phagesky #phage defence

Novel bacterial ubiquitination-like pathway!

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Mechanistic basis for protein conjugation in a diverged bacterial ubiquitination pathway - Nature Structural & Molecular Biology
Ye et al. define the structure and mechanisms of a bacterial pathway that performs ubiquitination-like protein conjugation, revealing new insights into the evolution and biological roles of ubiquitina...
www.nature.com
November 3, 2025 at 8:56 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
sykhalid.bsky.social
Really interesting interview. @timcoulson.bsky.social and I were also fortunate to chat with David Baker on our podcast which you can catch here: Science Of The Times EP7 Pt2 - Interview with 2024 Nobel Prize winner for Chemistry David Baker
youtu.be/jShxgJ3XrWA
November 2, 2025 at 6:24 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
asaflevylab.bsky.social
R.I.P Hamilton Smith, 1978 Nobel Laureate for the discovery of type II restriction-modification systems (HindII).
October 26, 2025 at 6:54 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
elliejameson.bsky.social
Day 26, Give. This virus of bacteriophage Zamilon virophage, might benefit the bacteria (or not). Virophage infect viruses, in particular the giant DNA virus family Mimiviridae. #Drawtober #PhageSky #SciArt
Black and white ink drawing of a hexagonal viral particle with a faint, pale 5-point star shaded with stippling.
October 26, 2025 at 8:14 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
melissawebby.bsky.social
Looking for a PhD? 🚀 MIBTP projects are out lots to explore!
🔬 #Bacteria • #AMR • #Interdisciplinary • FUN!
My projects explore how Gram-negative bacteria build and maintain their three-layered cell envelope, using cryo-EM, fluorescence microscopy and biochemistry.
warwick.ac.uk/fac/cross_fa...
Dr Melissa Webby
Dr Melissa Webby
warwick.ac.uk
October 23, 2025 at 5:56 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
joshuasweitz.bsky.social
In a break from recent themes & in honor of World Phage Week (Oct 22-28), some reflections on the world of bacteria and phage, part of a short series explaining the rationale for why we have invested so much time in exploring when microbes get sick too.

joshuasweitz.substack.com/p/happy-worl...
Happy World Phage Week to All Who Celebrate
Microbes get sick too - infected by bacteriophage or simply ‘phage’. A first post in a series on the hidden world of phage & how they transform human and environmental health.
joshuasweitz.substack.com
October 23, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
emmseveri.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

#microsky but kinda #phagesky too
Structural characterization of an extracellular contractile injection system from Photorhabdus luminescens in extended and contracted states - Nature Communications
Marín-Arraiza and colleagues report the cryo-EM structures of an extracellular contractile injection system from Photorhabdus luminescens in extended and contracted states, providing structural insigh...
www.nature.com
October 23, 2025 at 7:20 AM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
wvschaik.bsky.social
Interesting paper on bacteriophage genomics and bioinformatics

'Phage quest: a beginner’s guide to explore viral diversity in the prokaryotic world' by @sebwielgoss.bsky.social and colleagues

academic.oup.com/bib/article/...
Phage quest: a beginner’s guide to explore viral diversity in the prokaryotic world
Abstract. The increasing interest in finding new viruses within (meta)genomic datasets has fueled the development of computational tools for virus detectio
academic.oup.com
October 21, 2025 at 1:45 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
chrisvandergast.bsky.social
Our new paper out on influence of chronic pancreatitis on the gut microbiome. What makes this more special is it is Ryan Marsh’s 1st as corresponding author.

doi.org/10.1186/s128...
Investigating microbiota differences across chronic pancreatitis, influenced by lifestyle and genetic determinants - BMC Gastroenterology
Chronic pancreatitis (CP) is a multifaceted and irreversible inflammatory condition that impacts both endocrine and exocrine pancreatic functions. Whilst there is evidence of a general intestinal micr...
doi.org
October 21, 2025 at 2:50 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
emmseveri.bsky.social
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

#phagesky #phage defence #synbio #microsky
Emergence of antiphage functions from random sequence libraries reveals mechanisms of gene birth | PNAS
De novo gene birth—the emergence of genes from nongenic sequences—drives biological innovation, yet its adaptive potential remains poorly understoo...
www.pnas.org
October 18, 2025 at 9:57 AM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
jeremyjbarr.bsky.social
Very excited to share the latest work from our lab, which was published today in Nature!
nature.com/articles/s41...

PhD graduate and now post-doc Sofia Dahlman, along with co-senior author Sam Forster from The Hudson and other researchers from our lab and others.
Isolation, engineering and ecology of temperate phages from the human gut - Nature
Human host-associated cellular products may act as induction agents for bacteriophages.
nature.com
October 15, 2025 at 9:41 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
elliejameson.bsky.social
Day 15, Comfort. Phages are safe and protected away from UV light, heat and denaturing chemicals. Maybe they just need comfort of blankets and hot drinks to survive the autumn. #Drawtober #SciArt #PhageSky
Black and white ink cartoon of phages that have icosahedral heads and two dots for eyes, one is hiding in a tea cup, one has a take-away coffee balanced on its head and a third is wrapped in a blanket, in the middle is a siphovirus-like phage out in the open it looks worried as small droplets shoot out from its head
October 15, 2025 at 7:54 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
brockhurstlab.bsky.social
Three Bicentenary research fellowships on offer at @officialuom.bsky.social @fbmh-uom.bsky.social for exceptional ECRs with <3y postdoc experience

3yrs salary + £30k pa research expenses

Do you have a great idea & want to join @mermanchester.bsky.social?

www.bmh.manchester.ac.uk/research/sup...
Bicentenary Early Career Research Fellowships | Biology, Medicine and Health | University of Manchester
Find out about and apply for a Bicentenary Early Career Research Fellowship.
www.bmh.manchester.ac.uk
October 9, 2025 at 8:48 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
jrpenades.bsky.social
Our latest work reveals that arbitrium phages cross-communicate across species! These tiny viruses “listen” to signals from others, coordinating lysis-lysogeny decisions across species.
Original idea from @albertomarina.bsky.social and, as usual, he was right.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Phages communicate across species to shape microbial ecosystems
Arbitrium is a communication system that helps bacteriophages decide between lysis and lysogeny via secreted peptides. In arbitrium, the AimP peptide binds its cognate AimR receptor to repress aimX ex...
www.biorxiv.org
October 14, 2025 at 1:36 PM
antoniasagona.bsky.social
I have various PhD projects to offer via Midland Integrative Biosciences Training Partnership for candidates that they wish to come to @warwicklifesci.bsky.social. Please check lnkd.in/gQTPnk6W for more info, under the Microbiology section!
October 14, 2025 at 3:39 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
emmseveri.bsky.social
www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/jour...

#microsky #microbiome from the @gavinhthomas.bsky.social lab in York in collab with Hull
High-resolution Staphylococcus profiling reveals intra-species diversity in a single skin niche
The skin microbiome is dominated by a few key genera, among which Staphylococcus is one of the most well characterized. Recent studies have examined the roles of various Staphylococcus species such as...
www.microbiologyresearch.org
October 11, 2025 at 7:35 AM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
elliejameson.bsky.social
Day 7, Share. Inoviruses are filamentous single stranded DNA phages that can be produced continuously and exported by their host without lysis and killing their host. They have a single repeating major coat protein that covers their length and specialised spike proteins. #Drawtober #SciArt #Phagesky
Black and white ink drawing of two long filamentous phages. The one in the background is all the same distance away. In the foreground is a close up of the spike proteins of the closer phage with 5 repeated protein complexes forming what looks almost like a flower, the rest of the inovirus loops around into the background
October 7, 2025 at 9:57 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
elliejameson.bsky.social
Day 5, Moon. The physical structures of phages are often compared to the shape and landing action of a lunar lander, with tail fibres reminiscent of the landing struts, to gently settle on the surface of its host. #Drawtober #SciArt #Phagesky
Black and white ink drawing of the moon, with a giant phage on the top right that is half the width of the moon. The moon and phage are white, surrounded by a black circular background of messy, overlapping concentric circles
October 5, 2025 at 9:17 PM
Reposted by Antonia Sagona
proftracypalmer.bsky.social
Check it out! A proper team effort from past and present group members and a great collaboration with @sergemostowylab.bsky.social
biorxiv-microbiol.bsky.social bioRxiv Microbiology @biorxiv-microbiol.bsky.social · Oct 5
The Staphylococcus aureus LXG-domain toxins EsxX and SAR0287 do not promote virulence in a zebrafish larval infection model https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.10.04.680436v1
October 5, 2025 at 8:11 AM