Lezing | Van Leeuwenhoek Lecture on BioScience
Origins of antibiotic resistance
- Jan-Willem Veening (Lausanne)
- Datum
- donderdag 21 februari 2019
- Tijd
- Locatie
-
LMUY
Einsteinweg 55
2333 CC Leiden - Zaal
- 04.28
From 15.45 onwards: tea/coffee/biscuits
Drinks after the lecture
The rapid spread of antibiotic resistance, combined with a near absence of new antibiotics, are leading to a public health threat. One of the leading bacterial causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide is Streptococcus pneumoniae (the pneumococcus). Frighteningly, inappropriate antibiotic treatments can accelerate the occurrence of multidrug resistance by activation of a developmental process called bacterial competence.
In this van Leeuwenhoek lecture on BioScience, Jan-Willem Veening will discuss how antibiotics promote competence and how we can block horizontal gene transfer in pneumococci. Molecular insights into the mechanisms driving bacterial evolution and resistance will advance the quest for novel treatment strategies.
About Jan-Willem Veening
Jan-Willem Veening is full professor at the University of Lausanne (Department of Fundamental Microbiology) since 2016. He studied biology at the University of Groningen with a focus on genetics, statistics and biotechnology. In 2007 he obtained his PhD in Groningen, from 2006-2009 he was a postdoc in New Castle (in the group of Jeff Errington), after this period he returned to Groningen , where he started his own group, the Veening lab, within the Groningen Biomolecular Sciences and Biotechnology Institute. He is a member of De Jonge Akademie (KNAW).
The Veening lab (which moved to Lausanne) is interested in understanding fundamental processes in the pneumococcus, the main cause of community acquired pneumonia and meningitis. Using a multidisciplinary approach, including single cell techniques, systems and synthetic biology, members address how pneumococci grow and divide and segregate their DNA prior to cell division. The Veening lab is also interested in the role of phenotypic variation for pneumococcal virulence and antibiotic resistance development.
Upcoming Van Leeuwenhoek Lectures on BioScience (all Thursdays at 16 hrs.):
- 28 March 2019
Richard Smith,
Düsseldorf, Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding
- 11 April 2019
Valerian Dolja,
Oregon State University, Genome Research and Biocomputing
- 23 May 2019
Pamela Yeh,
UCLA, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
- 27 June 2019
Nick Lane,
London University College, Evolutionary Biochemistry
- 26 September 2019
Rob Phillips,
Pasadena, Caltech, Biology and Biological Engineering