Elizabeth Libby
Northeastern University, MA·Microbiology & Immunology
Bacteria constantly sense their surroundings and adjust how they grow, divide and behave as a group. One family of signaling enzymes behind these decisions is the Hanks-type serine/threonine kinases and phosphatases: kinases attach phosphate tags to proteins and phosphatases remove them.
- Fields
Microbiology & Immunology
Biology
Biophysics
- Topics
bacterial signaling
serine/threonine kinases
Hanks-type kinases
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2027
What they work on
- Quantitatively dissect how conserved Hanks-type serine/threonine kinase–phosphatase systems in Bacillus subtilis are wired, and how that architecture generates rare single cells with extreme phenotypes such as antibiotic resistance.
- Determine how these kinase–phosphatase systems control developmental transitions in B. subtilis, including competence for DNA uptake, biofilm formation, and sporulation.
- Identify features of Ser/Thr signaling conserved from B. subtilis to less genetically tractable, clinically important bacteria, including those tied to virulence and antibiotic tolerance.
More about the research
These systems are often essential, and they influence cell growth and division, antibiotic tolerance and resistance, spore formation and germination, virulence (the ability to cause disease), and biofilms, the sticky communities bacteria build. They work either by chemically modifying enzymes directly or by adding a layer of control over transcription factors from other pathways. How they operate is still poorly understood, especially in individual cells, where they can generate rare bacteria with extreme traits such as unusually high antibiotic resistance.
Why it matters
Rare bacterial cells that survive antibiotics or switch into an infective state make infections difficult to clear. Understanding the signaling architecture that produces these cells could support new anti-infective strategies and new antibiotics.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Niels Bradshaw
Brandeis University, MA·Biochemistry
Uncover general principles of how PPM serine/threonine phosphatases are regulated and directed to the right substrate, using bacterial phosphatases that control the general stress response, a survival pathway linked to virulence.
Jeffrey Tabor
Rice University, TX·Microbiology & Immunology
Test how two Bacillus subtilis stress-response gene networks decode time-varying activity of their main transcription factors, using an optogenetic system to deliver constant or oscillatory light inputs.
Elizabeth Shank
University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, MA·Microbiology & Immunology
Describe which genes are active, which lineages cells come from, and how cells are arranged in space among Bacillus subtilis cells that make biofilm matrix, swim or form spores.
The school
Northeastern University: 27 labs on PI Pages, $347M a year on research, 251 research doctorates a year.
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