A Publication in Nature Genetics

Sabancı University faculty member Erdal Toprak’s recent work with Roy Kishony of Harvard Medical School was published in yesterday’s (December 18, 2011) Nature Genetics (DOI: 10.1038/ng.1034). Dr. Toprak constructed a device, “the morbidostat”, in order to maintain a fixed level of drug induced growth inhibition as bacteria acquires higher resistance. Using morbidostat with Illumina whole genome sequencing, the team was able to identify resistance conferring mutations and the order these mutations appeared. In their paper which is highlighted by Nature Genetics, Dr. Toprak and Dr. Kishony reported that bacteria can become drug resistant by accumulating only a few mutations following a quasi-deterministic order.

Link for the paper:

http://www.nature.com/ng/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ng.1034.html