Announcements
2023
Congratulations Dr. Yahya! Ph.D. candidate Amal Yahya successfully defended her thesis on July 3, 2023 and now is Dr. Yahya! Dr. Yahya will return this summer to her native Saudi Arabia, where she will become an assistant professor near Riyadh and teach clinical technicians. We are so proud of how far she has come and will miss her presence in the lab.
Cabeen promoted with tenure. Dr. Cabeen was promoted to Associate Professor with Tenure on July 1, 2023, together with his colleague Dr. Karen Wozniak down the hall. Congratulations!
Underhill and Pan publish Nitro-PTS work. Former postdoc Dr. Simon Underhill and PhD candidate Somalisa Pan published a big project in which they examined the nitrogen-related phosphotransfer system (Nitro-PTS) in P. aeruginosa in unprecedented detail. Mary Erdmann, a talented undergraduate working with Soma, was also a coauthor. The team showed that unphosphorylated PtsN, which was previously implicated in lowering biofilm formation, is not sufficient on its own to reduce biofilm formation. They also showed that PtsN can be phosphorylated by a different enzyme I, FruB, but only in the absence of PtsO. PtsP also appears to be able to directly phosphorylate PtsN. Finally, using transcriptomics, they discover new systems that appear to be regulated by the Nitro-PTS, including production of a siderophore (pyoverdine) and express of Type III secretion. Congratulations Simon, Soma, and Mary! The paper is available in the Journal of Bacteriology (may require a journal subscription).
Congratulations Dr. Hamm! Ph.D. candidate Chris Hamm successfully defended his thesis on April 12, 2023 and now is Dr. Hamm! The good doctor has a great postdoc lined up at the University of Alabama-Birmingham, where he has also been awarded a competitive, NIH-funded MERIT fellowship that will also give him the opportunity to design a course and get teaching experience in parallel with his research. Chris is the first PhD to graduate from the Cabeen lab--we are so proud of you, Chris! He will begin his postdoc in July 2023.
Amal Yahya publishes biofilm work. PhD candidate Amal Yahya combined a huge amout of genetic work and phenotypic assays to explore new modes of biofilm regulation in P. aeruginosa. She and her undergraduate mentees Sophie and William showed that a number of genes that were differentially regulated in a deletion of 16550 (which shows decreased biofilm formation) largely do not impact biofilm formation but do impact motility. She also unexpectedly uncovered RecA as a biofilm-impacting gene and showed that both functions of RecA (SOS activation and recombination) appear important for wild-type biofilm levels. This work is published in Microbiollogy Spectrumfrom ASM and is available in open-access online.
2022
Cabeen wins CAS Junior Faculty Award for Scholarly Excellence. Dr. Cabeen took home the 2022 College of Arts and Sciences Junior Faculty Award for Scholarly Excellence in the Sciences subdivision. Each year, one award is given to junior faculty (between years 3 and 7) in each of the three subdivisions of CAS: Arts/Humanities, Social/Behavioral Sciences, and Sciences. The award requires off-campus peer references and includes a plaque and cash award. Congratulations Dr. Cabeen!
Chris Hamm publishes stressosome work. PhD candidate Chris Hamm brings a huge amount of microfluidics-based experimental work to fruition in a new publication about how different RsbR proteins influence the sigma-B response mediated by the stressosome in different stressors. He shows that RsbRA always shows a transient response, irrespective of stressor identity, but that other RsbR paralogs show different responses to different stressors. Hybrid fusion proteins show that both halves of RsbRA are required for its characteristic transient response. He was assisted in this work by undergraduate Dax Butler. Their work is in press at mBio as of November 2022. Congratulations, gentlemen!
Dr. Underhill elucidates modes of tricarboxylic acid uptake. Yes, E. coli and P. aeruginosa are both gamma-proteobacteria. But don't make the mistake of thinking that their metabolic preferences are the same. E. coli loves glucose, but P. aeruginosawould rather eat citrate-cycle intermediates like citrate and aconitate. Despite this preference, little has been known about the uptake mechanisms. New work by Dr. Simon Underhill revises the current model for citrate utilization by P. aeruginosa, showing the importance of the putative TctCBA transporter and identifying new and redundant citrate transporters. His work is in press at Journal of Bacteriology.
Baggett, Bronson publish follow-up pyocin paper. Recent graduates Nina Baggett and Adam Bronson are co-first authors on new work examining the differences between the absence of the XerC recombinase and the loss of recombinase function (via mutation or drug treatments) with respect to the basis for pyocin overproduction. Their work shows that only deletion of, and not inactivation of, XerC induces non-canonical pyocin expression. Moreover, known peptide inhibitors of bacterial recombinases do not induce pyocin expression. Their work is published in Miicrobiology Spectrum.
Rabi Khadka wins multiple departmental awards. Ph.D. candidate Rabi Khadka was a consistent winner in spring 2022! He was first selected for the departmental Ed and Mary Grula Graduate Fellowship. He followed up that win by being selected BOTH as the 2022 Outstanding Graduate Mentor and as the 2022 TA of the Year. These awards highlight Rabi's mentorship and teaching skills as well as his intellect and drive. You make us proud, Rabi!
Cabeen lab personnel win multiple symposium awards. At the Microbiology and Molecular Genetics Symposium held April 15, members of the Cabeen lab took home several presentation awards. PhD student Amal Yahya won 2nd place for her oral presentation, "Impact of RecA Functions on Pseudomonas aeruginosa Biofilm Suppression". PhD student Somalisa Pan and postdoc Simon Underhill shared a 2nd place award for their poster, "Characterization of the Nitro-PTS in Pseudomonas aeruginosa". PhD student Rabi Khadka took 3rd for his poster, "Mechanistic Basis for Stress Sensing by the Bacillus subtilis Stressosome". Good showing, guys!
Amal Yahya takes top honors at OCRID Symposium. Ph.D. candidate Amal Yahya took the top award, the Best Overall Presentation award, at the annual Oklahoma Center for Respiratory and Infectious Diseases (OCRID) Symposium held April 6. This award is given to the trainee who gives the top presentation at the entire symposium and comes with a substantial cash prize. Amal's talk was titled "Impact of RecA Functions on Pseudomonas aeruginosa Biofilm Suppression". Awesome job Amal!
Cabeen wins CAS Distinguished Teaching Award. Dr. Cabeen was awarded in spring 2022 the College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Teaching Award. The award requires undergraduate nominations and recommendations and is selected by a panel of students. Cabeen had previously been nominated for the award in 2020. The award honors faculty who have a demonstrated commitment to excellence in teaching and who foster student learning and enthusiasm.
Chris Hamm wins presentation award at regional ASM. Ph.D. candidate Chris Hamm took third place at the Missouri Valley Branch of ASM regional meeting hosted at OSU on Mar 18-19, 2022. His oral presentation was titled "Pseudomonas aeruginosa Pyocins Can Extend Antibiotic Effectiveness". The award came with a cash prize. Way to go Chris!
Mary Erdmann wins multiple OSU awards. Undergraduate researcher Mary Erdmann won multiple awards in spring 2022. She was first selected by the CAS Student Council as the departmental Outstanding Senior. Then she was selected as a 2022-2023 Niblack Scholar. She is also the recipient of the Sandra Trennepohl Women for OSU Endowed Scholarship. Mary, we are so proud of your achievements!
2021
Baggett, Bronson publish paper on pyocins. Recent graduates Nina Baggett and Adam Bronson are co-first authors on new work describing a non-traditional pathway for the production of pyocins--phage tail-like antibacterial complexes--by P. aeruginosa. Unexpectedly, the researchers found that a deficiency in or absence of a recombinase proteins called XerC causes very high pyocin production, but not via the usual mechanism. The results of the study have implications for antibiotic therapy. The work is published in mBio.
Graduate students advance to PhD candidacy. Graduate student Somalisa Pan passed her qualifying exam and advanced to formal PhD candidacy on September 9, 2021. She joins her fellow PhD candidates Rabi Khadka (August 9, 2021), Chris Hamm (May 28, 2021), and Amal Yahya (September 9, 2020), and at the moment all of the graduate students in the lab are now PhD candidates. Congratulations, crew!
Cabeen lab awarded NIH equipment supplement. The Cabeen lab was awarded an approximately $150,000 equipment supplement by the NIH to outfit a newly acquired inverted fluorescence microscope for sensitive fluorescence measurements, including a laser for fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP). FRAP can be used to detect the motion of molecules within living cells and derive diffusion rates and other kinetic data. This new equipment will help keep our work at the cutting edge of bacterial cell biology and genetics.
Hamm, Winburn publish educational paper. Ph.D. student Chris Hamm and AMS student Sarah Winburn collaborated to publish "Using Fluorescence in Biotechnology Instruction to Visualize Antibiotic Resistance & DNA" in The American Biology Teacher. (Find a link to the paper in our Publications.) The paper describes a low-cost apparatus to image fluorescent bacterial colonies using a smartphone camera. The apparatus, which is based on police-grade portable flashlights, can also be used for DNA gel imaging. Congratulations Chris and Sarah!
Cabeen selected as inaugural Pew Biomedical Scholars nominee. After an internal competition, Dr. Cabeen was selected as OSU's first-ever institutional nominee for the prestigious Pew Biomedical Scholars program. Invited institutions are allowed to nominate one junior faculty member for the nationwide selection process.
Cabeen receives OSU Excellence in Advising Award. Professor Cabeen received the University-wide OSU Excellence in Advising Award from the Provost in Spring 2021 to recognize his commitment to undergraduate and graduate advising.
Baggett receives top honors at MMG Symposium. Recent graduate Nina Baggett, who is staying an extra semester following her Dec. 2021 graduation before heading off to graduate school, was awarded 1st place among undergraduate oral presentations at the 2021 MMG Departmental Symposium on April 23. Nina's presentation was titled "An Alternative Pathway for Strong Pyocin Expression in P. aeruginosa". Congratulations Nina!
Cabeen receives Golden Torch Award. Professor Cabeen received the Golden Torch Award from the OSU Mortar Board on March 28. The award recognizes outstanding faculty members who have made significant contributions toward the success of students and is given annually to one faculty member from each College at OSU.
Sid Bush takes top honors at ASM Branch Meeting. Undergraduate researcher Sid Bush took 1st place among undergraduate oral presentations for his presentation, "The relative fitness of the stress-sensing RsbR paralogs in the Bacillus subtilis stressosome in various environmental stressors", at the 2021 Missouri and Missouri Valley ASM Branch Meeting, which was held virtually this year. Congratulations Sid, and well-deserved!
Paldara selected for Rice Business Plan competition.
The Rice Business Plan competition is the premier STEM-based competition in the country. First place is $350,000 in investment capital, $100,000 for second place, and $50,000 for third place. Twenty additional cash prizes are provided. Over the past 20 years the 700 teams that have participated have raised $2.67 billion in funding. You may recall that a couple of years ago, Mito Materials Solutions, an OSU student startup, place 2nd in the competition. That’s a distinction that we’re proud of to this day. We don’t submit an entry each year, but we did this year—Paldara. Paldara is an OSU student startup that has worked primarily with David Thomison. Paldara Pharmaceuticals is led by Beau Blanchard, MBA and MSE, William Colton, Master’s in Microbiology and Cabeen Lab alumnus, and Jacob Miller, an undergraduate finance major. The company is developing an innovative microbial gel coating to be used with existing catheters to reduce urinary tract infections (UTI) by 99 percent. The near eradication of UTI will lower health care costs and improve patient quality of life. Note—like Mito Paldara consists of MBA and STEM students (the two principals)—the combination that has produced our best startups. This year 440 teams applied for Rice and 54 were selected to compete. Now, for the fun. Click and fast-forward to about the 2:30 mark. The person you’ll see speaking is the director of the competition. Spoiler alert—Paldara made the top 54. What’s interesting is the peer group of schools that Paldara is part of. This speaks to how talented Paldara’s founders are, but also how far our program has come. In terms of business plan competitions, our peers are the schools you’ll see on the screen in a minute. Enjoy!!!
2020
Ph.D. students take top TA honors. We take teaching seriously, and our PhD student Rabi Khadka was named the Microbiology and Molecular Genetics Outstanding TA for 2019-2020. The runner up was Chris Hamm, another of our PhD students. Well done fellas!
Cabeen lab wins OCAST funding.
The Cabeen lab was one of 8 labs at OSU to win OCAST awards from the State of Oklahoma in 2020. The three-year award will support our studies of a DNA-binding protein that is involved in biofilm formation by P. aeruginosa. Our proposal was ranked 4th out of some 130 submissions! Read the OSU article.
Alum William Colton wins seed funding for company.
Former Cabeen lab undergrad and now Accelerated Master's student William Colton is a founder of a young company, Paldara Pharmaceuticals, that has recently won seed funding to advance its research and development. Paldara is operating out of a private laboratory in Stillwater. Great work William! Read the OSU article.
Cabeen lab awarded NIGMS MIRA funding. The Cabeen lab has won a MIRA (R35) grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) to support research in the lab for the next five years. We are grateful to the students who generated great preliminary data, mentors who offered critical feedback, colleagues who offered encouragement, and reviewers who carefully evaluated our proposal. Now to get to work making discoveries!
Student Sid Bush named 2020-2021 Niblack Scholar. We are proud to announce that one of our undergraduate researchers, Sid Bush, received a Niblack Research Scholarship for 2020-2021. Sid was also a Wentz Scholar, making him the first student from the lab to have won both of these prestigious research awards. Sid hopes after graduation to have a career in science industry.
Two new Wentz scholars to join the lab. Two undergraduate Wentz Research Scholars will join the Cabeen Crew for the 2020-2021 school year. Eliza Kent developed her own research project to examine how micropatterned surfaces affect bacterial growth on those surfaces. Bryn Goldsmith developed her own project about the effectiveness of charcoal-containing toothpaste for whitening and protection against tooth decay. We look forward to their work with us!
Cabeen featured on Pokes PodCAS. Dr. Cabeen was featured on Episode 18 of the Pokes PodCAS where he talks with interviewer Jacob Longan about the novel coronavirus and other microbiology-related topics. The podcast was recorded just before coronavirus lockdowns began in earnest.
Undergrads accepted into prestigious summer programs. Adam Bronson was accepted into a summer research program at the UCSF, and Nina Baggett was accepted into a program at UT-Southwestern. Both of these institutions are research powerhouses, and we are proud to have students participating in these highly competitive programs. Unfortunately these programs were canceled for this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but we are nonetheless proud that they WOULD have been there!
Cabeen receives CAS Mentoring Award. CAS Student Council is pleased to announce Matthew Cabeen as the CAS Outstanding Faculty Mentor Award recipient for 2019-20! Winners of this award are nominated by students and then selected by a student committee.
Cabeen lab part of new CoBRE award. We are pleased to announce that the Cabeen Lab is now NIH-funded as one of 5 inaugural labs in a new CoBRE, the Oklahoma Center for Microbial Pathogenesis and Immunity, centered at the Oklahoma Unversity Health Sciences Center in Oklahoma City and headed by Dr. Jimmy Ballard. The shared 5-year, $11M grant will support research on Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilm signaling in the lab. The Wozniak Lab is also one of the inaugural labs, and with this grant more than half of MMG faculty--everyone who works on projects somehow related to health--are NIH funded. Read the press release about the grant.
2019
Students win oral presentation prizes. Chris Hamm and Amal Yahya both gave oral presentations at the OSU Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Symposium. Chris took first place in the competition, and Amal took third. They are making the lab proud and inspiring others!
Lab wins OCRID Pilot Project Award for 2019-2020. In July our lab was awarded a 1-year NIH-funded OCRID Pilot Project Award to advance our research into mechanisms of P. aeruginosa biofilm formation. PhD student Somalisa Pan is taking the lead, joined by Julia Terrell whenever she is available.
Poster prizes by our students. Sarah Winburn gets a "hat trick" with a 3rd-place win among undergraduate posters in the Microbiology and Molecular Genetics Symposium. Julia Terrell does it too, along with Somalisa Pan--they take second in the undergrad poster competition! Well done! Plus Jake Osborne takes 2nd prize for his poster at the Wentz Research Symposium.
Two Cabeen lab students named Niblack Research Scholars. Our lab is proud of Nina Baggett and Adam Bronson, both of whom won this most selective designation for 2019-2020. The scholarships will support their research throughout summer 2019 and for the subsequent academic year.
Sam Shafer takes research to the Capitol. Our very own Samantha Shafer was selected as an OSU representative at Research Day at the Capitol in OKC, where she had the opportunity to present her research to our state lawmakers and raise the profile of research at OSU.
2018
Cabeen lab students take top poster honors. The Microbiology and Molecular Genetics Symposium was held on Friday, April 20, 2018 in the Student Union. About 30 students in the department presented posters at the symposium and were judged by faculty and graduate students. At the poster awards, our students Sarah Winburn and Chris Hamm took top honors for their poster on B. subtilis stress responses and survival, and Julia Terrell took second prize for her poster on PtsN function in P. aeruginosa. It should be noted that these students were first-time presenters---making it look easy, guys!
Four students win Wentz Research Grants. We are proud to announce that Sam Shafer, Sid Bush, Julia Terrell, and Jake Osborne are all recipients of competitive 2018-2019 Wentz Research Grants from OSU. Congratulations to Sam, Sid, Julia, and Jake, and we're looking forward to great research during their Wentz tenure!
New JoVE video protocol published. We have produced a video in collaboration with Rich Losick of Harvard University to illustrate the microfluidic platform upon which much of our B. subtilis research is based. The Journal of Visualized Experiments was created to provide peer-reviewed protocols in concert with professionally produced videos that illustrate complex scientific methods across a number of disciplines.
New students join Cabeen lab crew. We are happy to announce that Chris Hamm, Sam Shafer, Kate Smith, and Sarah Winburn have joined the Cabeen lab for the Spring 2018 semester, joining our existing group of outstanding student researchers. Welcome aboard!
2017
New research out! We are pleased to announce new research that was recently published by Dr. Cabeen in the open-access journal PLoS Genetics. This publication forms the basis for future work using microfluidic technology to observe the stress responses of Bacillus subtilis cells when subjected to different stress conditions. Read the paper here. Read the news article at the Harvard Molecular & Cellular Biology departmental website.
New research out! New research using microfluidic technology to study sporulation. Mainly the project of Dr. Jonathan Russell during his PhD work at Harvard with collaboration by Dr. Cabeen. Read the paper here.