BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Memento EPFL// BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:EPFL BioE Talks SERIES "Quorum Sensing Across Domains: From Virus es to Bacteria to Eukaryotes" DTSTART:20230327T160000 DTEND:20230327T170000 DTSTAMP:20260510T045158Z UID:ddaa0ce86f53a40b5880f7a30eb6fda7e8c825bde5fee029f83345c7 CATEGORIES:Conferences - Seminars DESCRIPTION:Prof. Bonnie L. Bassler\, Department of Molecular Biology\, Pr inceton University\, Princeton\, NJ (USA)\nWEEKLY EPFL BIOE TALKS SERIES\n \nAbstract:\nBacteria communicate with one another via the production and detection of secreted signal molecules called autoinducers. This cell-to-c ell communication process\, called “Quorum Sensing”\, allows bacteria to synchronize behavior on a population-wide scale. We showed that behavio rs controlled by quorum sensing are ones that are unproductive when undert aken by an individual bacterium acting alone but become effective when und ertaken in unison by the group. For example\, quorum sensing controls viru lence factor production and biofilm formation. We found that eukaryotes th at harbor quorum-sensing bacteria participate in these chemical conversati ons by providing the substrates bacteria need to make autoinducers. Finall y\, we found that quorum-sensing autoinducer information can be hijacked b y viruses that infect and kill bacteria. Thus\, interactions across the eu karyotic\, bacterial\, and viral domains all rely on quorum sensing. Using what we have learned\, we have built quorum-sensing disruption strategies for development into new anti-microbials. We have also engineered viruses to respond to user defined inputs\, rather than the bacterial autoinducer s\, to make phage therapies that kill particular bacterial pathogens on de mand.\n\nBio:\nBonnie L. Bassler is a member of the National Academy of Sc iences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is a Howard Hugh es Medical Institute Investigator and the Squibb Professor of Molecular Bi ology at Princeton University. Bassler received a B.S. in Biochemistry fro m the University of California at Davis\, and a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the Johns Hopkins University. She performed postdoctoral work in Genetics at the Agouron Institute\, and she joined the Princeton faculty in 1994. The research in her laboratory focuses on the molecular mechanisms that ba cteria use for intercellular communication. This process is called quorum sensing. Bassler’s research is paving the way to the development of nove l therapies for combating bacteria by disrupting quorum-sensing-mediated c ommunication. At Princeton\, Dr. Bassler teaches both undergraduate and gr aduate courses. Dr. Bassler directed the Molecular Biology Graduate Progra m from 2002-2008 and she currently chairs Princeton University’s Council on Science and Technology which has revamped the science curriculum for h umanists. Bassler is a passionate advocate for diversity in the sciences a nd she is actively involved in and committed to educating lay people in sc ience. Dr. Bassler was awarded a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship in 2002. She was elected to the American Academy of Microbiology in 2002 and made a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2004 . She was given the 2003 Theobald Smith Society Waksman Award and she is t he 2006 recipient of the American Society for Microbiology’s Eli Lilly I nvestigator Award for fundamental contributions to microbiological researc h. In 2008\, Bassler was given Princeton University’s President’s Awar d for Distinguished Teaching. She is the 2009 recipient of the Wiley Prize in Biomedical Science for her paradigm-changing scientific research. She is the 2011 recipient of the National Academies’ Richard Lounsbery Award . She is the 2012 UNESCO-L’Oreal Woman in Science for North America. In 2012\, Bassler was also elected to the Royal Society and to the American P hilosophical Society. Bassler was the President of the American Society fo r Microbiology in 2010-2011. She is currently the Chair of the American Ac ademy of Microbiology Board of Governors. She is a member of the National Science Board and was nominated to that position by President Barack Obama . The Board oversees the NSF and prioritizes the nation’s research and e ducational priorities in science\, math and engineering. She was an editor for a decade for Molecular Microbiology\, and is currently an editor of m Bio\, and Chief Editor of Annual Reviews of Genetics. She is an associate editor for Cell\, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences\, Journa l of Bacteriology\, and other journals. Among other duties\, she serves on the National Academies Board on Life Sciences\, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Science Education Committee\, and Discovery Communications’ S cience Channel Scientific Advisory Board. She serves on oversight\, grant\ , fellowship\, and award panels for the National Academies of Sciences\, N ational Institutes of Health\, National Science Foundation\, American Soci ety for Microbiology\, American Academy of Microbiology\, Keck Foundation\ , Burroughs Wellcome Trust\, Jane Coffin Childs Fund\, PEW Charitable Trus t\, Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation\, and the MIT Whitehead Institute.\n \n\nZoom link (with one-time registration for the whole series) for attend ing remotely: https://go.epfl.ch/EPFLBioETalks\n\n\nInstructions for 1st-y ear Ph.D. students who are under EDBB’s mandatory seminar attendance rul e:\nIF you are not attending in-person in the room\, please make sure to\n \n send D. Reinhard a note before noon on seminar day\, informing that you plan to attend the talk online\, and\n be signed in on Zoom with a recogn izable user name (not a pseudonym making it difficult or impossible to be identified).\n\nStudents attending the seminar in-person should collect a confirmation signature after the talk - please print your own signature sh eet beforehand (71 kB pdf available for download here).\n  LOCATION:via Zoom web-streaming only https://go.epfl.ch/EPFLBioETalks http s://go.epfl.ch/EPFLBioETalks STATUS:CONFIRMED END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR