Plant-microbe interaction resulted in different physio/chemical responses by host plant and interacting rhizobacteria.

In this thesis, bioorthogonal chemistry is combined with correlative light-electron microscopy to selectively label and study pathogenic intracellular bacteria within the host immune cell.

Extending our current arsenal of antibiotics is key to staying ahead in the arms race between humans and resistant bacteria.

Global healthcare is on the verge of an antibiotic availability crisis as bacteria have evolved resistance to nearly all known antibacterials. Identifying new antibiotics that operate via novel modes-of-action is therefore of high priority.

With the rise of multi-drug resistant bacterial pathogens, the possibility of a post-antibiotic world is quickly becoming reality.

Streptomyces are prolific producers of enzymes and secondary metabolites, including more than 50% of all clinical antibiotics. This makes them highly attractive for medical, biotechnological, and industrial purposes.

The overall objectives of my thesis are to investigate the dynamics of the sorghum root microbiome and to explore the beneficial effects of the root microbiome on sorghum growth and stress tolerance.

The investigation into the bidirectional communication between the gut and its host is a rapidly growing area of research, attracting considerable attention for its potential to provide crucial insights into health and disease.

The aim of this thesis is to study cell-cell interactions and the development of an assay to explore and quantify the exchange of membrane compounds.

A complex community of microbes develops in the infant gut shortly after birth. We call this community the infant gut microbiota. The microbiota influences the health of the infant, which makes the composition and function of the infant gut microbiota an important topic to study.

Antimicrobial drugs constitute a fundamental part of modern medicine. The global rise in antimicrobial resistance poses a major threat to global health.

Streptomyces are bacteria abundant in soil that participate in diverse and complex interactions. These bacteria are the main producers of the antibiotics we currently use in the clinic.

Autophagy is a fundamental degradative process, maintaining cellular homeostasis and functions in host defense against intracellular pathogens, including mycobacteria and Salmonella.

Promotores: Prof.dr. H.J.M. de Groot, Prof.dr. J. Matysik (Universitaet Leipzig)

The aim of this thesis was to study phage infection in Streptomyces, focused on cell wall-deficient cells. Bacteriophages (or phages in short) attach to the cell wall of bacteria after which they replicate and lyse the host cell.

Polymyxins are clinically used antibiotics, discovered in mid-20th century. Once abandoned due to excessive nephrotoxicity, they are now used increasingly to address infections caused by multi-drug resistant Gram-negative bacteria.In this thesis, we describe the development and synthesis of analogues…

Bacteria have the ability to alter their morphology in order to adapt to changing environments.

Vinasse is a major by-product generated by the sugarcane biofuel industry. It is a source of microbes, nutrients and organic matter and often it is recycled as fertilizer.

Promotores: Prof.dr. H. van Veen & Prof.dr. W. de Boer (Wageningen University)

Bacteria are highly complex and diverse organisms that have adapted to survive in ecological niches ranging from the most extreme to the most heterogeneous environments.

Bacteria often experience external challenges, such as changes in environmental conditions or attacks by bacteriophages.

Vancomycin is a last-resort antibiotic for the treatment of many Gram-positive bacterial infections, while remaining inactive against Gram-negative strains.

Promotor: Prof.dr. T. Schmidt

The increasing resistance of pathogenic bacteria to antibiotics necessitates the discovery of new medicines.

In this thesis, I focused on studying the above- and belowground interactions of J. vulgaris from a plant-soil feedback (hereafter, PSF) perspective. I investigated the temporal variation of negative PSF and examined the effects of root-associated bacteria on plant performance and aboveground herbiv…

Promotor: G.P. van Wezel, Co-promotor: D. Claessen

Antibiotic resistance, caused by widespread use of antibiotics, leads to bacterial infections that are difficult, if not impossible, to treat and is a major worldwide health concern.

Plants are colonized by an astounding number of microorganisms that can provide different life-support functions, including nutrient acquisition and protection against (a)biotic stresses like drought or pathogen attack.

The soil-dwelling, filamentous bacteria of the genus Streptomyces are renowned for their production of useful secondary metabolites including antibiotics. The work described in this thesis provides new insights on the role and regulation of antibiotic production and resistance in these bacteria.

β-Lactamases are enzymes that can break down β-lactam substrates, such as antibiotics, preventing the use of these antibiotics for the treatment of various infectious diseases. However, some compounds, β-lactamase inhibitors, can block these enzymes allowing for possible treatments using a combination…

Op deze pagina vindt u de opnames van de online This Week's Discoveries vanaf 12 mei 2020 en een lijst sprekers vanaf oktober 2015.

Op deze pagina vind je de opnames van de Tuesday Talks sinds april 2025. Ook de opnames van de voorloper van de Tuesday Talks, This Week’s Discoveries, zijn hier te vinden

Given the accelerating appearance of antimicrobial resistance, there is an urgent need for more fundamental research into novel antibiotic strategies. The work in this thesis helps to address this global problem by developing new antibiotic compounds, inspired by the antibacterial mechanisms of the…

Almost all bacteria are enveloped by a cell wall that provides cellular protection.

We showed that constitutive and inducible chemical and morphological defenses against Western flower thrips differ between tomato and chrysanthemum plants.

This work has described synthetic strategies towards well-defined structures resembling capsular polysaccharide (CPS) fragments, CPS mimics, teichoic acid (TA) fragments as well as a third-generation ring-closing tandem metathesis (RCM) linker to better exploit the potential of automated synthesis.

This thesis investigates the relations between metabolism and anatomy through the use of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI).

Every organisms in the tree of life faces the same challenge: the length of its DNA exceeds the volume of the cell it needs to fit in. Several strategies have evolved to solve this problem, one of them being the expression of proteins that bind and organize the DNA.

Streptomyces are filamentous bacteria that produce more than two-thirds of known antibiotics.

Bacterial chemosensory arrays are protein assemblies that are the key structural and functional component for motile bacteria to sense their internal or environmental chemical signals.

This thesis aims to investigate the effect of tripartite interaction between microbial inoculants, the plant, and herbivore insects on the rhizosphere microbiome and volatilome. We investigated the rhizosphere microbiome and volatilome of tomato plants exposed to insect herbivory and/or inoculated with…

Promotor: H.P. Spaink, Co-Promotor: A.H. Meijer

Promotor: Prof.dr. G.P. van Wezel

The long-held desire - to link structure directly to function and to explain molecular mechanisms based on basic chemical or physical principles - is finally coming closer, satisfying not only our scientific curiosity but also offering new solutions to the many challenges in the field of health, energy…

Promotor: Prof.dr. J. Kuiper

Streptomyces are multicellular, Gram-positive bacteria in the phylum of actinobacteria which produce a high amount of bioactive natural products of which the expression is tightly coordinated with the life cycle.

Promotor: G.P. van Wezel

This ecological community has long been known to affect host biology, and their diverse roles have been further clarified in recent years following numerous studies of animal:microbiota interactions in diverse systems.

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria pose a major health threat. Addressing this challenge requires among others the development of new antibacterial compounds. The research described in this thesis focuses on discovering novel antibiotics from soil bacteria, specifically Streptomyces and Paenibacillus.Despite…

Promotor: Prof.dr. H.P. Spaink, Co-promotor: Dr. M. van der Zee