A story about Pseudomonas

Researcher Michelle Hulin recently took to Twitter to tell the story of how her work has unfolded since 2017. Michelle, based at The Sainsbury Laboratory, is part of the Pseudomonas-Prunus project team.

Michelle explained how she, Mojgan Rabiey and other colleagues, sequenced the genomes of Pseudomonas syringae samples from cherry orchards across the UK. Some of these bacterial strains were pathogenic, others were not. Through gene sequencing they also studied a particular prophage which seems to be involved in virulence. Prophages are sections of bacteriophage (viral) DNA which integrate into the bacterial genome. Prophages are an important mechanism for gene transfer between bacteria and may explain why some bacteria are pathogenic and others are not.

Michelle’s tweets were timed to mark the publication of this research in the journal New Phyologist – and also Michelle’s birthday! You can read Michelle’s Twitter thread below or find it on Twitter https://twitter.com/michhulin/status/1585574839200485377