Rosetrees Interdisciplinary workshop: Quantitative approaches to antimicrobial resistance and microbiology

25 -26 January 2022
via Zoom

Organising committee: 
Dr. Jacob Biboy (Newcastle University)
Dr. Leonardo Mancini (University of Cambridge)
Dr. Marco Mauri (University of Edinburgh)
Dr. Hamed Mosaei Sejzi (Newcastle University)
Dr. Abimbola Feyisara Adedeji Olulana (University of Sheffield)
Prof. Jamie Hobbs (University of Sheffield)
Prof. Simon Foster (University of Sheffield)

Workshop overview

Anti-Microbial resistance (AMR) is one of the most pressing global challenges for humankind. A breakthrough in tackling AMR requires, amongst other things, the integration of physics and biology. Physics has a crucial role to play since, with multiple time and spatial scales involved, AMR is an emergent property of a complex system. Hence, the quantitative approaches to antimicrobial resistance and microbiology--what do physics-driven approaches help us to understand about AMR?

​This conference is jointly organized by the UKRI funded “Physics of Antimicrobial Resistance” consortium, the UKRI Physics of Life network, and the Rosetrees Trust funded Physics of Medicine network.

Purpose

The aim is to bring together researchers in the AMR community from Bacterial Biophysics, microbiology to Clinical sectors, to discuss the recent discoveries in the field and how to bridge the gap between the fundamental research and clinical applications. We have also make arrangement for networking where the attendees will get to meet and chat with speakers to try to replicate some of the opportunities that physical meetings present. In particular, this meeting is being co-organised by the ECRs in our consortium and we are very conscious that the pandemic has reduced the opportunities for those at this career stage to meet and network with their larger community. We really encourage all attendees to join in with this aspect of the meeting.

Who should attend?

We invite participation by academic, industrial and clinical scientists in the UK and abroad who are interested in the central goal of generating new collaborative research interaction at the physics/life sciences interface focussed on understanding bacteria and tackling antimicrobial resistance. This meeting will take place on Zoom, the designated link will be sent via email to all the  registered attendees.

Provisional programme

Please note, all times are in UK time (GMT).

Day One	25th January 2022
11.00	Welcome from Jamie Hobbs
Session 1	Chaired by Simon Foster
11.15	Mohammad Roghanian (Rigshospitalet, Department of Clinical Microbiology) 'Allosteric regulation of (p)ppGpp synthetases'
11.45	Ioanna Mela (University of Cambridge) 'DNA nanostructures as a tool for targeted antimicrobial delivery'
12.00	Cécile Morlot (Institut de Biologie Structurale) 'Secrets of bacterial cell wall assembly revealed by biorthogonal metabolic labeling and fluorescence nanoscopy'
12.30	Networking
13.00	Lunch
Session 2	Chaired by Jamie Hobbs
14.00	Ethan Garner (Harvard University) 'Searching for new drug targets beyond PBPs: using microscopy to find factors regulating cell wall synthesis"'
14.30	Seamus Holden (Newcastle University) ​'Molecular motor tug-of-war is a key regulator of Bacillus subtilis elongasome dynamics and cell shape'
14.45	James C Gumbart (Georgia Tech) 'Conformational dynamics during assembly of the multidrug efflux pump AcrAB:TolC'
15.15	Flash Presentations and Poster Session
Session 3	Chaired by Pietro Cicuta
16.15	Sven Van Teeffelen (Université de Montréal) 'Interplay of cell-envelope growth, envelope synthesis, and physiology in rod-shaped bacteria'
16.45	Bart Hoogenboom (UCL) '​Phase separation in the outer membrane of Escherichia coli'
17.00	Kerwyn C Huang (Stanford) 'Quantitative predictions of microbial community assembly based on resource competition'
17.30	Networking

Day Two	26th January 2022
Session 4	Chaired by Steve Smye
9.30	​William Hope (University of Liverpool) 'Life, AMR and the Inverted U'
10.00	Aidong Han (Xiamen University) 'Bacterial signal transduction through two-component systems'
10.15	Stephen A Renshaw (University of Sheffield)  'Using transparent zebrafish larvae to understand AMR infection'
10.45	Networking
11.15	Break
Session 5	Chaired by ​Hamed Mosaei Sejzi
11.30	Rebecca Corrigan (University of Sheffield)  '(p)ppGpp: alarmones controlling growth, stress adaptation and antimicrobial tolerance'
12.00	Iago Grobas (University of Oxford) 'The dynamics of single to multilayer transitions in bacterial swarms'
12.15	Paul Higgins (University Hospital Cologne)  'Implementation of whole genome sequencing in surveillance and diagnostics of antimicrobial resistance'
12.45	Lunch
Session 6	Chair Rosalind Allen
13.30	​Knut Drescher (University of Basel) 'Responses of bacterial biofilms to external stresses'
14.00	​Jinju Chen (Newcastle Univesity) 'Surface physics enabled antibiofilm materials with potential to tackle biofilm infections without triggering antimicrobial resistance'​
14.15	Abimbola Feyisara Adedeji Olulana (University of Sheffield) and Leonardo Mancini (University of Cambridge) 'The Physics of Antimicrobial Resistance'
14.45	​​Flash presentations, Poster Session and Networking
​Session 7	Chaired by Waldemar Vollmer
​16.15	​​Sarah Beagle (Washington University) 'Spontaneous and transient resistance to the Beta-lactam, Mecillinam, in Klebsiella pneumoniae'
​​16.45	James Wheeler (University of Sheffield)​ 'Fatal attraction: bacterial chemotaxis towards antibiotics'
​17.00	​Grant J Jensen (Caltech) 'A great first step is always to just image things you are studying at the highest resolution possible – several recent examples from electron cryotomography'
​17.30	​Concluding remarks from Simon Foster
​17.30	​Networking

Event recordings