It's time for the 2022 application cycle! We are reopening our HMS_SysBio SSQBio application assistance program for the third year at the following link. Can't wait to meet the new applicants! forms.gle/DyshN9KfbAznQV…

If you are applying to the HMS_SysBio SSQBio PhD program this cycle, consider applying to our application assistance program! Participants will be matched with current students who will help with application materials and answer any questions. forms.gle/mdDMUwtFV5eZDi…

Cookie decorating competition at the Michael Baym lab retreat using the Zymo Research cookie cutter! Thank you for the decoration inspo! Which is your winning cookie?

Today in nature we share our work describing • how to achieve resistance to natural viruses, • a technology that prevents the escape of engineered genetic information, • how viruses overcome genetic-code-based resistance. nature.com/articles/s4158…

Check out this awesome work by Natalia Quinones-Olvera and Siân Owen on discovering and exploring the world of plasmid dependent phages! It was so fun to watch this project come together, and I learned so much from you guys along the way. Congratulations!!

Having a great day visiting Boston and rubbing shoulders with @Baym in his lab (where my talented daughter is a PhD candidate 🙂❤️)

Living the [phage biologist's] dream today, touring the legendary Deer Island wastewater treatment plant in Boston🥚🥚🥚

Very excited to add this financial support to the educational, research, and emotional support that my mentors, lab mates, friends, and family have provided throughout grad school <3

We've long been able to find new phages and figure out what they interact with. But what about the other way: if you have a gene, like an antibiotic resistance efflux pump, or a phage defense system, and you want to find phages that do or do not interact with it? Now you can!

.Ellie Rand (Harvard Medical School) etal developed a new targeted #Phage Discovery method based on multiple fluorescent markers, allowing for co-culture w/ multiple hosts & visualization of phages — no more selecting only for dominant phages in samples! buff.ly/41dkOdN

The latest work from my lab, Phage Disco, a method Ellie Rand developed for targeted discovery of bacteriophages based on the bacterial receptor, defense system, or other component they interact with, is now live in mSystems