Our laboratory uses electron tomography, combined with several structural and cell biology techniques, to study cell surfaces of prokaryotes at the atomic level. Surface molecules mediate cellular interactions with the environment and play important roles in key processes including cell adhesion, biofilm formation and antibiotic tolerance in pathogenic bacteria.
Subtomogram averaging (left) reveals surface layer structures on bacterial cells (right).
Our research aims to push the boundaries of cellular structural biology, with technical developments aimed at identifying molecules on cell surfaces, and resolving their high-resolution details in prokaryotic cells. While structural biology of many cell surface molecules reveals fundamental information about bacteria and archaea, our work has clear biomedical relevance, for example surface molecules allow pathogenic bacteria such as P. aeruginosa to evade antibiotics with biofilm formation.
Phage liquid crystals protect bacteria from antibiotics (left). Cryo-EM guided development of bacterial biofilm inhibitors (right).
Selected Papers
- Melia, C., Bolla, J.R., Lanwermeyer, S.K., Mihaylov, D., Hoffmann, P.C., Huo, J., Wozny, M.R., Elfari, L.M., Böhning, J., Owens, R.J., Robinson, C.V., O’Toole, G.A., Bharat, T.A.M. (2021)
Architecture of cell-cell junctions in situ reveals a mechanism for bacterial biofilm inhibition.
BioRxiv, - von Kügelgen, A., Tang., H., Hardy, G.G., Kureisaite-Ciziene, D., Brun, Y.V., Stansfeld, P.J., Robinson, C.V., and Bharat, T.A.M. (2020)
In Situ Structure of an Intact Lipopolysaccharide-Bound Bacterial Surface Layer
Cell 180(2): 348-358 - Tarafder, A.K., et al., von Kügelgen, A., Mellul, A., Schulze, U., Aarts, D. and Bharat, T.A.M (2020)
Phage liquid crystalline droplets form occlusive sheaths that encapsulate and protect infectious rod-shaped bacteria
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, - Bharat, T.A.M., Ciziene, D.K., Hardy, G.G., Yu, E.W., Devant, J.M., Hagen, W.J., Brun, Y.V., Briggs, J.A., and Löwe, J (2017)
Structure of the hexagonal surface layer on Caulobacter crescentus cells
Nature Microbiology 2: 17059 - Bharat, T. A., Murshudov, G. N., Sachse, C., and Löwe, J. (2015)
Structures of actin-like ParM filaments show architecture of plasmid-segregating spindles.
Nature 523: 106-110 - Bharat, T. A., Davey, N. E., Ulbrich, P., Riches, J. D., de Marco, A., Rumlova, M., Sachse, C., Ruml, T., and Briggs, J. A. (2012)
Structure of the immature retroviral capsid at 8 Å resolution by cryo-electron microscopy.
Nature 487: 385-389
Group Members
- Jan Böhning
- Ido Caspy
- Zo Ford
- Suzanne Letham
- Hannah Ochner
- Olivia Smith
- Abul Tarafder
- Andriko von Kügelgen
- Zhexin (Eric) Wang