Origin of Lignin Biosynthesis

A new paper, "Ancient origin of the biosynthesis of lignin precursors," was published today in Biology Direct, with Ph.D. student Leen Labeeuw and Dr. Rebecca Case (Department of Biological Sciences) as lead and senior authors, respectively. The authors propose that the genes associated with the biosynthesis of p-coumaryl alcohol, the simplest lignin monomer, found in algal genomes likely evolved long before the transition of photosynthetic eukaryotes to land.

As co-authors, Yan contributed his expertise in phylogenetic analysis and was involved in the design of the experiment, and Dr. Patrick Martone (University of British Columbia) provided novel gene sequences for the study.

Major evolutionary events hypothesized in the evolution of the lignin biosynthetic pathway across the eukaryotic tree (from Labeeuw et al., 2015)

FGSR Teaching Award for Tania

Tania is one of the recipients of the 2015 Graduate Student Teaching Award from the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research (FGSR). Dr. Jonathan Schaeffer, Dean of the Faculty of Science, hosted a lunch get-together for all awardees at the Faculty Club. Congratulations!

Dr. Jonathan Schaeffer and Tania during the awarding ceremony

2015 AITF Graduate Student Scholarship Awardees

Congratulations to Tania and incoming Ph.D. student Tareq for receiving the Alberta Innovates – Technology Futures (AITF) Graduate Student Scholarships!

Tania is also currently a holder of the NSERC Postgraduate Scholarship  –  Doctoral award. Tareq will join the lab in the fall and is also the recipient of the University of Alberta Doctoral Recruitment Scholarship.

Tania's BacPac Presentation

Tania will present her current work at the seventh installment of the Bacterial Pathogens Club (BacPac) meeting for the 2014/2015 season.

BacPac is held every first Thursday of the month from (except January) during the fall and winter terms. It is organized by Dr. Stefan Pukatzki (Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology).

Yan Featured in the "Brock Biology of Microorganisms"

Happy New Year! What a great start of the year for the Boucher Lab.

Yan's research is featured in the 14th edition of the Brock Biology of Microorganisms (chapter 12, p. 347), with an electron microscopy picture contribution by Paul. To Paul's horror, the picture is attributed to...

"Phil Kirchberger, University of Alberta"


Congratulations Yan and PHIL!

Brock Biology of Microorganisms 14th edition cover (by Pearson Education, Inc., 2015)

Fabini's BacPac Presentation

Fabini will present his current work at the fourth installment of the Bacterial Pathogens Club (BacPac) meeting for the 2014/2015 season.

BacPac is held every first Thursday of the month from (except January) during the fall and winter terms. It is organized by Dr. Stefan Pukatzki (Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology).

Genomics: The Power and the Promise Conference – Ottawa, Ontario

The Genomics: The Power and the Promise Conference was held at the Ottawa Convention Centre on November 24-26, 2014, hosted by Genome Canada and the Gairdner Foundation. This conference celebrated the achievements in genomics research in Canada and allowed participants to meet some of the best genomics researchers in the world.

Fabini was one of 30 participants, out of nearly 150 abstract submissions, invited to present a poster at the conference. The poster session covered studies from various fields – agriculture, energy, environment, fisheries, forestry, health, and mining. Included in his acceptance was a travel award that covered his expenses during his stay in Ottawa.

A copy of the presented poster, "Comparative genomics of Vibrio metoecus with its close relative Vibrio cholerae reveals its pathogenic potential," can be found here and the published abstract here.

Fabini presenting his poster at the Genomics conference

New Vibrio Species Closely Related to Vibrio cholerae

After a long and frustrating debate on what to name the new bacterium, the official species description for Vibrio metoecus is finally published! The paper is entitled "Vibrio metoecus sp. nov., a close relative of Vibrio cholerae isolated from coastal brackish ponds and clinical specimens" and published in the International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology today. Yan and Paul lead the research group, which included prominent environmental microbiologist Dr. Rita Colwell (University of Maryland). As the title of the paper mentions, the newly described species, V. metoecus, is now the known closest relative of the well-known V. cholerae.

V. metoecus was formerly and unofficially named V. metecus. The Boucher Lab is currently pursuing more research work to gain insight on the evolution and emergence of this new species.

Electron micrographs of V. metoecus. (A) Scanning electron microscopy, scale bar = 2 μm; (B) Transmission electron microscopy, scale bar = 0.2 μm (from Kirchberger et al., 2014)

Publication Awards for the Boucher Lab

Yan, Fabini, and co-authors, lead by Dr. Lee Katz and Dr. Cheryl Tarr of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), received two prestigious CDC awards in recognition of their paper entitled "Evolutionary dynamics of Vibrio cholerae O1 following a single-source introduction to Haiti," published in the journal mBio on July 2, 2013.

For their work, the group received the James H. Nakano Citation Award from the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID) for one of the best papers of 2013 and a Charles C. Shepard Award nomination (Laboratory Science category) from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.

The awards were accepted by members of the CDC group during the ceremony (pictured below).

Accepting the James H. Nakano Citation Award at the CDC (from left): Nakano's son, Lori Gladney, Lee Katz, Cheryl Tarr, Beth Bell (director of NCEZID), Maryann Turnsek, and Molly Freeman (photo by Lee Katz)