The PhD thesis concerns our team's long-term research focused on investigating the molecular and cellular mechanisms involved in the development and differentiation of spatially organized yeast structures (biofilms and colonies). Our recent research has uncovered novel regulations of biofilm formation and dispersal at the solid-liquid interface (npj Biofilms Microbiomes 6, 7, 2020; PLoS Genet 14: e1007495, 2018) as well as novel regulatory functions of the Whi2p-Psr1p/Psr2p complex in the coordinated evolution of yeast populations (PNAS 117: 15123, 2020; G3 12: jkab432, 2022). The PhD thesis will be part of our new research direction focusing on the identification of conditions and factors (including regulators) important for microbial cell adhesion and biofilm formation on differently modified solid surfaces (metals, plastics). Although the focus is on mechanisms in pathogenic and non-pathogenic yeasts, part of the planned research will also include selected bacteria. The range of methods includes the construction of fluorescently labeled strains, microscopy, spectroscopy and proteomic approaches.
Five relevant publications of the research group:
Palková Z, Váchová L. (2021) Spatially structured yeast communities: Understanding structure formation and regulation with omics tools. Comput Struct Biotechnol J. 19: 5613-5621. doi: 10.1016/j.csbj.2021.10.012.
Maršíková J, Pavlíčková M, Wilkinson D, Váchová L, Hlaváček O, Hatáková L, Palková Z. (2020) The Whi2p-Psr1p/Psr2p complex regulates interference competition and expansion of cells with competitive advantage in yeast colonies. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 117: 15123-15131. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1922076117
Van Nguyen P, Plocek V, Váchová L, Palková Z (2020) Glucose, Cyc8p and Tup1p regulate biofilm formation and dispersal in wild Saccharomyces cerevisiae. npj Biofilms Microbiomes 6: 7. doi: 10.1038/s41522-020-0118-1
Nguyen PV, Hlaváček O, Maršíková J, Váchová L, Palková Z. (2018) Cyc8p and Tup1p transcription regulators antagonistically regulate Flo11p expression and complexity of yeast colony biofilms. PLoS Genet 14: e1007495. doi: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1007495
Vachova L, Stovicek V, Hlavacek O, Chernyavskiy O, Stepanek L, Kubinova L, Palkova Z. (2011) Flo11p, drug efflux pumps, and the extracellular matrix cooperate to form biofilm yeast colonies. J Cell Biol 194: 679-87. doi: 10.1083/jcb.201103129
Deadline is closed
