Tanmay Bharat

From April 2022, Tanmay Bharat's group will be located at the MRC laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, maintaining a small team at the Dunn School.

Structural cell biology of bacterial biofilm formation

Rather than living as single, isolated cells in liquid cultures, most bacteria on this planet form macroscopic, surface-attached, multi-cellular communities known as biofilms. Bacterial biofilms play a role in many diseases and medical conditions including cystic fibrosis, bone, wound and urinary tract infections. Bacterial cells in a biofilm community show increased tolerance to antibiotics, making medical treatment difficult. Understanding this fundamental bacterial developmental process is therefore critical to understand the colonization process of pathogenic bacteria.

The goal of our group is to apply structural and cell biology techniques to study general principles governing bacterial biofilm formation. We use electron cryomicroscopy (cryo-EM) and tomography (cryo-ET) to resolve structures of molecules that mediate biofilm formation. Correlated light and electron microscopy (CLEM) and mass spectrometry (MS) are used to support our investigations. We combine in vitro reconstitution of key molecules with in vivo imaging to understand how bacteria form biofilms.

Scientists interested in our work are welcome to contact Tanmay Bharat (tanmay.bharat@path.ox.ac.uk) for more details. We have positions available at all levels.

For a full publication list click here

Relevant Publications

Tarafder, A.K., et al., von Kügelgen, A., Mellul, A., Schulze, U., Aarts, D., Bharat, T.A.M
2020

Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A (in press)

von Kügelgen, A., Tang., H., Hardy, G.G., Kureisaite-Ciziene, D., Brun, Y.V., Stansfeld, P.J., Robinson, C.V., and Bharat, T.A.M.
2020

Cell, 180(2): 348-358

Bharat, T.A.M., Ciziene, D.K., Hardy, G.G., Yu, E.W., Devant, J.M., Hagen, W.J., Brun, Y.V., Briggs, J.A., and Löwe, J
2017

Nature Microbiology, 2 17059

Bharat, T. A., Murshudov, G. N., Sachse, C., and Löwe, J.
2015

Nature 523, 106-110

Bharat, T. A., Davey, N. E., Ulbrich, P., Riches, J. D., de Marco, A., Rumlova, M., Sachse, C., Ruml, T., and Briggs, J. A.
2012

Nature 487, 385-389