Alfonso Santos Lopez
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asantoslopez.bsky.social
Alfonso Santos Lopez
@asantoslopez.bsky.social
Evolution of antibiotic resistance. Ramón y Cajal Fellow at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. https://amrevolution.es/
Pinned
Our new manuscript is out! A bit of everything cool:

Plasmids ✅
Insertion Sequences ✅
AMR Evolution ✅
Microbial Communities ✅
Databases analyses ✅
Mathematical modeling ✅

See the scientific thread below of Jorge Sastre, who has brilliantly led this work with @palomarodera.bsky.social
New paper out! 🔈🔈📣📣

Plasmids promote antimicrobial resistance through Insertion Sequence-mediated gene inactivation.

Combining experimental and computational approaches, we unveil how two of the most prevalent bacterial MGE accelerate the evolution of AMR. 🧵👇🏻

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Plasmids promote antimicrobial resistance through Insertion Sequence-mediated gene inactivation
Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) is a major threat to public health. Plasmids are mobile genetic elements that can rapidly spread across bacterial populations, promoting the dissemination of AMR genes i...
www.biorxiv.org
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Bacteria chromosomes contain Genomic Islands that provide virulence, antibiotic resistance, MGE-defence,... They transfer between cells, but the mechanism of most remains elusive.

Here we explore the conjugative capacity of these mysterious Genomic Islands.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
www.biorxiv.org
January 14, 2026 at 10:14 AM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
New preprint from the lab!

Stress-Induced Cooperation Promotes Tolerance in Resource-Limited Auxotrophic Microbial Consortia.

Great and long journey with great collaborators.
We’re very happy to share the results from the last chapter of my PhD, now out as a preprint on bioRxiv
www.biorxiv.org/content/bior...
www.biorxiv.org
January 14, 2026 at 9:05 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
We’re very happy to share the results from the last chapter of my PhD, now out as a preprint on bioRxiv
www.biorxiv.org/content/bior...
www.biorxiv.org
January 14, 2026 at 8:25 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
🚨Call for papers🚨
Microbial Evolution: Impacts on Human Health
in the society journal Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health

Guest Editors: Bob Woods, Silvie Huijben & Camilo Barbosa
EIC: me

This will be great, please submit and share!
academic.oup.com/emph/pages/m...
January 9, 2026 at 4:49 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
New preprint from my lab (with Arya Kaul, @fernpizza.bsky.social, and @brinda.eu), in which we explore new genes hitchhiking on the beneficial deletion that fused them together, and find them in the LTEE, M. Tb/bovis, and across the bacterial tree of life
Novel genes arise from genomic deletions across the bacterial tree of life https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.01.05.697752v1
January 6, 2026 at 4:12 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
🚨🚨🚨

We're looking for a research tech to work on alt splicing, pancreatic islets and diabetes. The goal is to set a high-throughput platform to investigate the role of alternative exons in beta cell biology!

Interested in joining our lab at @melisupf.bsky.social? 👇

www.upf.edu/documents/d/...
www.upf.edu
December 23, 2025 at 12:36 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Preprint alert📢! 
Ever wondered how much bacterial parasites influence evolutionary outcomes of their host?
➡️ We co-evolved two bacterial strains in conditions in which the costs and benefits of prophage carriage varied

Here is what we found. 
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
#MicroSky #PhageSky
🧵
Environment-dependent evolution drives divergent adaptive strategies and parasite dynamics in a minimal community
Prophages, phage genomes integrated into bacterial chromosomes, are widespread, yet, the extent to which these resident parasites contribute to host fitness and shape evolutionary trajectories, partic...
www.biorxiv.org
December 18, 2025 at 2:11 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
It was great to write a brief commentary with @sociovirology.bsky.social on @nanamikubota.bsky.social and @vscooper.micropopbio.org's recent discovery of cheat-driven cycles in Pseudomonas (www.cell.com/current-biol... - amazing example of the tragedy of the commons!

🧪 #socialviruses #evosky
Phage–bacteria dynamics: The tragedy of the commons at hyperspeed
A recent study found that apparently stable coexistence between a clinically important pathogen, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and its integrated prophages can break down, setting off an evolutionary cycle ...
www.cell.com
December 4, 2025 at 8:56 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
What is the best strategy to win any contest?

Eliminate your opponents of course.

Recently, my friend @fernpizza.bsky.social showed how plasmids compete intracellularly (check out his paper published in Science today!). With @baym.lol, we now know they can fight.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
November 20, 2025 at 10:12 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Hot off the press! Our latest paper led by @fernpizza.bsky.social, understanding how plasmids evolve inside cells. These small, self-replicating DNA circles live inside bacteria and carry antibiotic resistance genes, but also compete with one another to replicate. 1/
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Intracellular competition shapes plasmid population dynamics
From populations of multicellular organisms to selfish genetic elements, conflicts between levels of biological organization are central to evolution. Plasmids are extrachromosomal, self-replicating g...
www.science.org
November 20, 2025 at 9:42 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
🚨 Excited to share our new paper is out! 🎉
We show how interactions within gut microbiomes allow certain antibiotic-resistant E. coli strains to persist even without antibiotics, helping explain how resistance is maintained in the human gut.

Now published in @natcomms.nature.com rdcu.be/eOf63
Multi-layered ecological interactions determine growth of clinical antibiotic-resistant strains within human microbiomes
Nature Communications - The role of ecological factors in modulating the spread of antibiotic-resistance bacteria in the gut remains unclear. Here, the authors use anaerobic microcosms to study the...
rdcu.be
November 7, 2025 at 9:15 AM
Do plasmids really move around that much? Well, maybe not always

Thrilled to have contributed to this story with two of my favourite microbiologists: @jrpenades.bsky.social & @sanmillan.bsky.social

This great work was led by Akshay Sabnis & @wfigueroac3.bsky.social

www.cell.com/cell-reports...
Non-conjugative plasmids limit their mobility to persist in nature
Sabnis et al. explain why non-conjugative plasmids move at a low rate in nature. While increased mobility can easily evolve by incorporating phage DNA into plasmids, this is disadvantageous because it...
www.cell.com
October 22, 2025 at 5:47 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
New paper with my (amazing) friend and mentor @jrpenades.bsky.social
Really looking forward to see what plasmid aficionados think of this one!!
With @asantoslopez.bsky.social @wfigueroac3.bsky.social Akshay Sabins and others
www.cell.com/cell-reports...
Non-conjugative plasmids limit their mobility to persist in nature
Sabnis et al. explain why non-conjugative plasmids move at a low rate in nature. While increased mobility can easily evolve by incorporating phage DNA into plasmids, this is disadvantageous because it...
www.cell.com
October 22, 2025 at 1:12 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
✨New paper from @jrpenades.bsky.social and @sanmillan.bsky.social labs. We found that non-conjugative plasmids 🧬 tend to have low mobility to promote functional diversity ⚔️💊 in bacterial communities🦠🦠.
Brilliant work by Akshay, @asantoslopez.bsky.social and others.

www.cell.com/cell-reports...
Non-conjugative plasmids limit their mobility to persist in nature
Sabnis et al. explain why non-conjugative plasmids move at a low rate in nature. While increased mobility can easily evolve by incorporating phage DNA into plasmids, this is disadvantageous because it...
www.cell.com
October 22, 2025 at 1:37 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
📢¡Oferta de trabajo en el CBM!
El grupo de David Ruano ofrece un contrato predoctoral para desarrollar un nuevo método diagnóstico del SIBO (Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth).
Plazo hasta el 30 oct.
Info👇
www.cbm.uam.es/index.php/jo...
Predoctoral contract - Centro de Biología Molecular Severo Ochoa
Contract for the doctoral thesis project: «Development of a new diagnostic method for SIBO».   Call We are looking for a student to join our research team (https://rebrand.ly/druanogallego) at the Sev...
www.cbm.uam.es
October 17, 2025 at 2:37 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
🚨🚨🚨
Two super well-funded PhD grants from our MSCA Doctoral Network @evomg-dn.bsky.social at our lab at @melisupf.bsky.social, @crg.eu and the @evomg-bcn.bsky.social Program.

If you're excited about evolution, genomics and biomedical research, this is your DN! 😃

Further info: www.evomg-dn.eu and 👇
EVOMG-DN
EvoMG-DN is a European Doctoral Network funded by the Horizon Europe Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA), composed of 14 beneficiaries and associated partners from both academic and non-academic sectors.
www.evomg-dn.eu
October 15, 2025 at 7:02 AM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Session 3 (Thr 09/10 in the afternoon) was dedicated to Microbes, microbiome and antibiotic resistance.
October 12, 2025 at 2:53 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Nuestro compañero Álvaro San Millán (@sanmillan.bsky.social), investigador en el #CNB_CSIC ha recibido el Premio María Moliner, que reconoce la labor de quienes se inician en la dirección de tesis doctorales, destacando su compromiso en el acompañamiento del talento emergente.

¡Enhorabuena!👏
csic.es CSIC @csic.es · Oct 9
🏆 El #CSIC entrega las Medallas Margarita Salas, Premios Tesis Relevante y Premios María Moliner   

🔬 Con estos galardones, la institución reafirma su compromiso con la excelencia investigadora, el aprendizaje y la formación de nuevas generaciones

👉 https://f.mtr.cool/zledhiknbb
October 9, 2025 at 1:21 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
New preprint!

Ever wondered why only a fraction of genomes encode CRISPR immunity? 🧬 🦠

Turns out CRISPR is rarely beneficial against virulent phages, being most beneficial against those for which resistance mutations are rare!

An epic effort by Rosanna Wright

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Resistance mutation supply modulates the benefit of CRISPR immunity against virulent phages
Only a fraction of bacterial genomes encode CRISPR-Cas systems but the selective causes of this variation are unexplained. How naturally virulent bacteriophages (phages) select for CRISPR immunity has...
www.biorxiv.org
October 6, 2025 at 6:27 AM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Imagine we could travel back in time ⏪⌛️to explore the world of bacterial pathogens before humans discovered and industrialised antibiotics

We just did that to study the history of #AMR spread @science.org
doi.org/10.1126/scie...

If you like time travel & biology, this 🧵is for you👇
Pre- and postantibiotic epoch: The historical spread of antimicrobial resistance
Plasmids are now the primary vectors of antimicrobial resistance, but our understanding of how human industrialisation of antibiotics influenced their evolution is limited by a paucity of data predati...
doi.org
October 6, 2025 at 10:42 AM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Published in Current Biology! P. aeruginosa can use its filamentous phage to inhibit competitors but high phage production is susceptible to cheater miniphage invasion. Subsequent phage tragedy of the commons can lower bacteria and phage fitness. Link: authors.elsevier.com/c/1lt5I3QW8S...
October 2, 2025 at 3:54 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
October 1, 2025 at 8:22 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
View from the lab now. Did I mention that we are recruiting faculty microbiologists?

www.linkedin.com/posts/vaughn...
September 29, 2025 at 2:43 PM
Reposted by Alfonso Santos Lopez
Delighted to see our paper studying the evolution of plasmids over the last 100 years, now out! Years of work by Adrian Cazares, also Nick Thomson @sangerinstitute.bsky.social - this version much improved over the preprint. Final version should be open access, apols.
Thread 1/n
September 25, 2025 at 9:29 PM