Thursday, 17th July Australian Society for Microbiology Annual Scientific Meeting 2025

• Using genomics to disentangle antimicrobial resistance gene transmission driven by mobile genetic elements - Anna Sheppard
• Perfecting bacterial genome assemblies with Autocycler - Ryan Wick
• First national characterisation of drug resistance and persistent genomic clusters of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Australia: Actionable insights for enhanced surveillance - Jessica Webb
• Genome-scale mutagenesis and sorting reveals the regulatory network for the hypervirulence-associated siderophore, aerobactin, in Klebsiella pneumoniae - To Nguyen
• Isolation and characterisation of Pseudomonas aeruginosa phages vB_Psu_NEU2023 and vB_Psu_NEU2024 result in the establishment of a new genus, Alasiavirus - Liana Theodoridis
• PHOLD: USING PROTEIN STRUCTURAL HOMOLOGY & PROTEIN LANGUAGE MODELS TO ENHANCE PHAGE GENOME ANNOTATION - George Bouras
• Disturbed soils and type 2 diabetes gut microbiomes share compound-level potential metabolism trends for excess energy harvesting and deficient energy management - Craig Liddicoat

• P. aeruginosa is a notorious member of the ESKAPE pathogens known for its association with multi-drug-resistant infections - Sarah Vreugde
• TARGETING BACTERIAL INFECTIONS: INVESTIGATING L-FORM BACTERIA FOR NEXT-GENERATION PHAGE THERAPEUTICS - Aleksandra Petrovic Fabijan
• TRADING TAILS: Identification of native protein scaffolds leading to the engineering of designer bacteriophages. - Rhys A Dunstan
• High Throughput Phage-Host Matching with ‘Phlow’ - Lucy L Furfaro
• Innovation in Enteric Virus Research: Cell Lines and in vivo Shedding Models for the Study of Adenovirus F-40/41 - Valeria M Sanders
• Unveiling New Insights: Immune Priming and Natural Resistance Against HaHV-1 in Australian Abalone - Jacinta R Agius
• Harnessing ‘phage training’ to enhance phage activity against uropathogenic Escherichia coli - Natasha Torriero-Smith

• Intriguing relationships between substrates and inhibitors of multidrug efflux pumps - Helen Zgurskaya
• PeptAIde: An ensemble AI pipeline for rapid Identification of novel Phage-Based antimicrobial peptides - Ramon Roca Pinilla
• Drug efflux pump inhibitors: From bench to bedside - Rietie Venter
• Overcoming Multidrug resistant Gram-negative Infections with Synergistic Combinations of Antibiotics and Octapeptin Lipopeptides - Mark AT Blaskovich
• Design and Synthesis of Dual-Acting Antimicrobials: Alleviating the Burden of Antimicrobial Resistance - Lily Kenchington-Evans
• Azithromycin analogues with improved quick-killing activity have broad mechanisms of action against malaria parasites. - Emma Y Mao
• Repurposing the CF drug ivacaftor as an efflux pump inhibitor to reduce resistance and virulence in Pseudomonas aeruginosa - Sida Liu

• On chicken and egg and chromosome segregation in Pseudomonas aeruginosa - Valentin Rybenkov
• TaxSEA: Rapid Interpretation of Microbiome Alterations Using Taxon Set Enrichment Analysis and Public Databases - Feargal J Ryan
• Understanding the enhanced immune responses to high-density microarray patch vaccination through spatial transcriptomics and antibody repertoire analysis - Paul Young
• No type? No problem! A Novel Broad-Spectrum Vaccine for Non-Typeable Haemophilus influenzae. - Carla R Gallasch
• Natural microbial metabolites against the apicomplexan parasites; Plasmodium falciparum and Toxoplasma gondii - Maria Gancheva
• Investigating correlates of protection in the non-human primate model of pharyngitis by comparison of Combo#5 vaccines adjuvanted with Alum and SMQ - Steven J Hancock and Steven Hancock

• Title to follow - Dietmar Hutmacher
• Validation of safety and efficacy of the on-demand antimicrobial hydrogel for precise and rapid elimination of bacterial infection in murine and porcine infected wounds - Zlatko Kopecki
• Title to follow - Kirby Lattwein
• Exploring the therapeutic potential of Cell-penetrating peptide conjugates of peptide nucleic acids (PNA) for Targeted Inhibition of Small RNA00203 and Disruption of Biofilm mediated Antibiotic Resistance in Acinetobacter baumannii - Abebe Mekuria Shenkutie
• The antibiofilm and wound healing efficacy of plasma-activated water - Angela Boahen
• Bioengineering physiological in vitro models to investigate implant-associated Biofilms - Silvia Cometta
• Liquid crystal lipid nanoparticles for the effective co-delivery of gentamicin and biofilm-dispersing enzyme to combat Escherichia coli biofilms - Anam Ahsan

• Lysosome Interrupted: Coxiella burnetii manipulation of the human recycling centre. - Hayley Newton
• Where metabolism and virulence meet – sulfoxide reductases as determinants of bacterial survival in Haemophilus influenzae, Escherichia coli and beyond. - Ulrike Kappler
• Tripartite efflux pumps in Gram-positive bacteria? - Christopher Stubenrauch
• A plasmid-encoded protein modulates sporulation in Paraclostridium sordellii - Sarah A Revitt-Mills
• Using One Stone to Kill Three Birds: RNAi technology showed Promising  Anti-viral Activity Against Respiratory Viruses of Pandemic Potential - Victor Oti
• Structural basis of phospholipid transport to the bacterial outer membrane by the translocation assembly module. - Matthew T Doyle
• Structural Insights into KvrA: A MarR Homologue that Senses and Responds to Copper Stress - Stephanie Penning

Hosts: Emily Gulliver & Melanie Hutton

Speakers:

• Associate Professor Andrea Stringer - Head of the Gut Health Group, University of South Australia
• Dr Andrew Robertson - Head of Drug Product Development, Biomebank
• Dr Damjana Bogatic - Inflammatory Bowel Disease Clinical Research Fellow, The Queen Elizabeth Hospital, South Australia

This workshop explores the complex interplay between nutrients, the gut microbiota and gut disease as well as emerging microbial-based therapies in gastrointestinal health and disease. We will examine current and emerging microbial therapies, including the use of probiotics, dietary strategies and cultured therapies with a special focus on the clinical applications and mechanisms of fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) in IBD management. We will hear from leading experts in the academic, clinical and industry space with a panel discussion to follow.

Have you ever wondered what an insertion sequence is? Or what is the difference between an insertion sequence and a transposon? And once you’ve worked out the difference, how exactly do you analyse them?  What about bacteriophages — how do they fit and how are they classified? If you've ever found yourself pondering these, and other questions, then this is the workshop for you! This interactive MGE workshop session will provide a gentle introduction to the theory and analysis of some of the most challenging mobile genetic elements: Transposable elements and bacteriophages.

Come along to learn the following:

• What are insertion sequences and transposons
• What are bacteriophages and how are they classified
• What tools and approaches are used for the analysis of transposable elements and bacteriophages

Speakers:

• Associate Professor Sally Partridge - Principal Research Fellow, The Westmead Institute for Medical Research, Westmead Hospital and the University of Sydney 
• Ms Bhavya Papudeshi - PhD student, Flinders Accelerator for Microbiome Exploration, Flinders University, Adelaide

Hosts/Chairs:

• Dr Galain Williams - Research Fellow, Department of Microbiology, Biomedicine Discovery Institute, Monash University
• Ms Tasnia Islam - PhD student, Department of Microbiology, Biomedicine Discovery Institute, Monash University