Author: karreradjoko

It is an exciting time in the lab as we welcome new metallophiles!

Rowan Armstrong joins us as a PhD student, funded by the BBSRC NEEDL Doctoral Training Partnership. Rowan will examine Cu import by commensal Neisseria. He is co-supervised by Dr Kesha Josts (Newcastle University) and Dr Matt Bashton (Northumbria University).

Sophie Cadman is an MBiol Research Project student. Sophie will collaborate with Mathematical Sciences students to produce an experimentally validated mathematical model for explaining the effects of metal ions on bacterial growth.

Anna Herren is a Level 3 Research Project student. She will assess binding of non-cognate metals to a Cu metallochaperone from pathogenic Neisseria.

Finally, Freddie Willoughby returns as a Level 3 Research Project student to continue on his summer project, which was to determine how Cu and Cu chelators influence growth of commensal Neisseria.

Here is the new group photo minus Safa, who is in Portugal for her industrial placement.

Safa will be working with Bac3Gel in Lisbon, Portugal for the next 3 months as part of her Professional Internship for PhD Students programme, funded by the BBSRC Newcastle-Liverpool-Durham Doctoral Training Partnership. We went out for a group coffee to wish her all the best. We can’t wait to hear all about her experience when she returns in January.

Archie, Will, and Karrera had a wonderful time in Sorrento, Italy at the International Copper Meeting 2026. Archie and Will presented posters while Karrera presented an invited talk. Archie and Will’s trips were supported by travel grants from Microbiology Society (to both) and Biochemical Society (to Will).

We are pleased to have been awarded a Laboratory Efficiency Assessment Framework Bronze Award, in recognition of our collective efforts to carry out research in an environmentally sustainable manner.

Congratulations to Maya Basran, a L3 Research Project student in our lab this year, for receiving the Undergraduate Recognition Award from Biochemical Society. Here she is pictured with her mum and BSc Biochemistry lecturers.

We are excited to host Asal Khoshravan Azar from The University of Edinburgh for a week. Asal is a PhD student in Matteo Degiacomi’s lab and is examining the molecular dynamics of the nitrite reductase AniA and metallochaperone AccA from pathogenic Neisseria. She is in Durham to learn how key experiments that help with the modelling work are carried out.

Very pleased to see our contributions on characterising Cu-binding host defense peptides from ants published online! We are grateful to the project leads, Alfredo Angeles-Boza and Jonathan Klassen, both from the University of Connecticut, USA, for the opportunity to join their adventures in insect biology.

Ant abaecin-2 is a context-dependent copper-binding effector that can be either inhibitory or protective.

We are saying goodbye (for now) to Freddie Willoughby, a 6-week undergraduate summer intern in our lab. Freddie will return in October as a Level 3 Research Project student to continue working on TonB-dependent receptors in oral Neisseria.

Congratulations to recent Level 3 Research Project students Maya Basran and Jonas Flohr for earning the top overall marks in the BSc Biochemistry and BSc Biology graduating cohorts, respectively!

Maya is off to an MPhil in Cambridge University while Jonas is off to a round-the-world bicycle adventure! We wish them all the very best in their next steps. 

Lizzi (MRes student) and Thomas (MSc student) have both reached the end of their projects. Both of them are moving on to PhD studentships – Lizzi at Oxford University & UKHSA, while Thomas at University of Strathclyde. We are sorry to see them go but wish them both all the very best in their next steps!