One of nature’s tiniest predators 🦁 is Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus which kills, invades & eats up other bacteria 🦠. Studying predator protein abundances we found a bacterial prey-degradation enzyme.
Read full blog article in Springer Nature Research Community here: tiny.cc/zmju001
#Microsky

Multiple small, curved, predatory bacteria (Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus) lyse the bacterial prey remnants below. How are they doing this & which predator proteins are involved in this process?

See our newly released research article 📑
=> rdcu.be/eL6gu

🦠 #microsky #bacteria #PredatoryBacteria

✨I am thrilled to announce that my #ERCStG project will be funded by @erc.europa.eu. It explores how predatory bacteria interact with bacteria, which they invade and kill 🔬. I am very grateful to the ERC, the panel, reviewers, mentors, collaborators and colleagues! 🙏
#ERCStG => tiny.cc/174s001

Saying bye to Interlaken (CH) after inspiring microbiology meeting #SSM2025 with many great talks and posters! It’s great to see the phage field thriving with multiple keynotes, as well as poster and presentation prizes!

What’s better than aiming to treat a bacterial disease? Prevent it in the first place!
I am very happy to have „met“ Max von Pettenkofer today in Munich. He is the pioneer in #hygiene. I am glad that the audience in his institute was interested in my research on predatory bacteria. #Microsky

5/ Overall we support the research community with a toolbox addressing existing limitations in B.bacteriovorus engineering, supporting tailored applications and fundamental studies of this predator in microbial ecology, agriculture, biotechnology and medicine.

4/ B.bacteriovorus is a 'professional secreter', but the secretion process is sparsely explored. We established a method for rapid & quantitative detection of protein secretion by B. bacteriovorus using different promoters & signal peptides to achieve different secretion levels of a luciferase.

3/ We investigated native and synthetic promoters with varying expression levels next to different ribosomal binding sites. We showed their efficacy in driving expression of the fluorescent reporter protein mScarletI3 at both the population and single-cell level.

2/ B. bacteriovorus kills other bacteria & holds great potential to address challenges in medicine & agriculture. Currently, limited availability of versatile genetic tools & secretion assays constrain fundamental studies and bioengineering of B. bacteriovorus. Therefore, we developed a toolbox 🛠️.

🛠️Toolbox 🛠️ out to modulate gene expression & protein secretion in a predatory bacterium.
📑Preprint from my group below.
Many thanks to L. Mihajlovic @ljmihajlovic.bsky.social, L. Hofacker, F. Lindner, P. Jayakumar & A. Diepold @diepold-lab.bsky.social! #MicroSky #SyntheticBiology #PredatoryBacteria

If you are at #VAAM2025 in Bochum (D), and curious about bacteria 🦠 that kill ⚡ other bacteria 🦠 . My talk will be tomorrow, Wed, at 10:15 am in Lecture hall 5, HZO-80. Looking forward seeing you there. #MicroSky

End of a great day in Milano, talking about Bdellovibrio and eating lunch in prison „escape“ (restaurant by inmates). Thank you to Fernanda Pinheiro for the kind invitation.

For a good start into 2025 we offer a small treat 🎁 (preprint) to quantitative proteomics and predatory bacteria 🦠 researchers. Our predatory proteome of B.bacteriovorus offers high temporal resolution (based on n=5 biological repeats!) for a better understanding of the killing process. #MicroSky

3) Mutation frequency in the E.coli prey genome peaks under high predatory pressure. We show that predation resistance can be coupled to genetic mutations. Prominently, outer membrane porin F was mutated, next to other genes.

2) Encouragingly, there is a fitness trade-off between predation resistance and prey growth in absence of predation.

1) Repeated exposure of E.coli K-12 (as prey) to predator B.bacteriovorus leads to growth of E. coli under predation. This predation resistance evolves only under predation.