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Contact Details

Phone
+64 3 479 7081
Email
richard.cannon@otago.ac.nz
Position
Professor of Molecular Microbiology
Department
Department of Oral Sciences
Qualifications
MA PhD(Cantab)
Research summary
Oral biology, oral microbiology and antifungal drug resistance
Teaching
Professor Cannon teaches oral microbiology to dental students, oral health students, and dental technology students

Research

Professor Cannon is a molecular microbiologist with research interests in oral microbial infections, oral biology, and tissue regeneration. He has studied the role of saliva in oral colonisation by bacteria and yeast. He has investigated the virulence genes of the oral fungal pathogen Candida albicans. Professor Cannon has applied molecular biology and metabolomic approaches to investigate dimorphism in C. albicans and the molecular basis of cancer.

A major focus of his research is the drug resistance of human fungal pathogens. He has found that clinically significant fungal drug resistance is due to energy-dependent drug efflux from the cell. His research group has developed a unique system for expressing and studying these efflux pumps, and other membrane proteins, in baker's yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. He is currently using S. cerevisiae strains expressing efflux pumps from a variety of fungi to study pump function and structure and to search for pump inhibitors. Professor Cannon also contributes to research on tissue regeneration of relevance to bone defects and periodontal disease.

Publications

Deng, L., Guan, G., Cannon, R. D., & Mei, L. (2025). Age-related oral microbiota dysbiosis and systemic diseases. Microbial Pathogenesis, 205, 107717. doi: 10.1016/j.micpath.2025.107717 Journal - Research Article

Zhao, M., Lamping, E., Niimi, K., Niimi, M., & Cannon, R. D. (2025). Functional analysis of Candida albicans Cdr1 through homologous and heterologous expression studies. FEMS Yeast Research. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1093/femsyr/foaf012 Journal - Research Article

Guan, G., Coates, D. E., Sun, Q., Cannon, R. D., & Mei, L. (2025). Atomic force microscopy for revealing oncological nanomechanobiology and thermodynamics. ACS Nano, 19(11), 10862-10877. doi: 10.1021/acsnano.4c14837 Journal - Research Article

Liu, X., Zhang, H., Xu, L., Ye, H., Huang, J., Xiang, J., … Cannon, R. D., … Zhai, Q. (2025). cGAMP-targeting injectable hydrogel system promotes periodontal restoration by alleviating cGAS-STING pathway activation. Bioactive Materials, 48, 55-70. doi: 10.1016/j.bioactmat.2025.02.010 Journal - Research Article

Long, F., Pu, X., Wang, X., Ma, D., Gao, S., Shi, J., … Cannon, R. D., & Han, T.-L. (2025). A metabolic fingerprint of ovarian cancer: A novel diagnostic strategy employing plasma EV-based metabolomics and machine learning algorithms. Journal of Ovarian Research, 18, 26. doi: 10.1186/s13048-025-01590-w Journal - Research Article

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