Communities of bacteria undergo population bottlenecks which are crucial to their population, ecological, and evolutionary dynamics. However, conventional amplicon sequencing cannot distinguish such d...

Abstract. The current economics of scientific publishing reveal a profound imbalance: academia pays prices far exceeding the actual costs of publication. R

Multiple genetic codes developed during the evolution of eukaryotes and bacteria, yet no alternative genetic code is known for archaea. We used proteomics to confirm our prediction that certain archae...

AbstractMotivation. Over the past years, substantial numbers of microbial species’ genomes have been deposited outside of conventional INSDC databases.Resu

Alberta’s moves to restrict treatment are based in ignorance and misinformation

I wanted to offer my thoughts, as a climate scientist, on the widely discussed memo published by Bill Gates in late October 2025. While I actually do agree with some of the specific points made therein regarding the urgent global need to accelerate efforts to reduce global poverty and improve human

The viability of Antarctic ice shelves under low rates and high rates of global warming is modelled to estimate when it will become unfeasible for the ice shelves to maintain their present-day shape.

Culture-independent metagenomic approaches have proven to be effective tools for identifying previously hidden biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs) encoding novel natural products with potential medical relevance. However, producing these compounds remains challenging as metagenomic BGCs often originate from organisms phylogenetically distant from available heterologous hosts. Lasso peptides, a subclass of ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptide (RiPP) natural products, exhibit diverse bioactivities, yet no lasso peptide has previously been discovered directly from a metagenome. Here, we report the discovery and heterologous expression of the first soil metagenome-derived lasso peptide. Expression of its biosynthetic gene cluster in Escherichia coli, followed by mass spectrometry analysis, strongly supported the predicted amino acid sequence and lasso structure of the peptide. Notably, this lasso peptide is the first to feature asparagine as the ring-forming residue at position one. Taxonomic analysis of the corresponding BGC identified an uncultivated member of the Steroidobacterales family (Gammaproteobacteria) as the closest known relative of the potential native host. These findings underscore the potential of metagenomic genome mining to reveal structurally novel RiPPs and to expand our understanding of the natural diversity of lasso peptides.

Supervisors who invest in positive mentoring relationships with their PhD candidates also reap the benefits for their own research.

Loretan and colleagues present a low-cost smartphone-based microscope capable of detecting single-molecule fluorescence. This approach opens doors to personalised and widely distributed applications in diagnostics, biosensing, and science education.

Understanding complex living systems requires identifying universal phenomenological laws that are independent of species and molecular-biological ...

Search 4 Careers available at University of Calgary.

In this Consensus Statement, a consortium of microbiome scientists discuss current sequencing data sharing policies and propose the use of a Data Reuse Information (DRI) tag to promote equitable and collaborative data sharing.