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Contact Details

Phone
+64 3 479 7735
Email
peter.fineran@otago.ac.nz
Position
Professor
Department
Department of Microbiology and Immunology
Qualifications
BSc (Hons) PhD
Research summary
Molecular microbiology and bacteriophages, Genetics, Biochemistry, Molecular biology

Research

Our research goal is to understand the interactions between mobile genetic elements, such as bacteriophages and plasmids, and their bacterial hosts. Our main interest is in phage resistance mechanisms.

The page-bacterium ‘arms race’

Accumulating evidence demonstrates that viruses are the most abundant biological entities on the planet. They outnumber bacteria by approximately 10 to 1 and there are an estimated >1030 tailed bacteriophages globally! The result is an obvious selective pressure for bacteria to acquire resistance to phage attack and for phages to acquire counter defence mechanisms. Indeed, many mechanisms of phage resistance are known, ranging from bacterial cell surface alterations, through restriction and modification, to abortive infection. Our research focuses on:

  • Abortive infection and toxin-antitoxin 'innate immune systems'
  • CRISPR-Cas 'adaptive immune systems'
  • Phages as antimicrobial agents

Publications

Warring, S., Sisson, H. M., Randall, G., Grimon, D., Dams, D., Gutiérrez, D., Fellner, M., Fagerlund, R. D., … Jackson, S. A., & Fineran, P. C. (2025). Engineering an antimicrobial chimeric endolysin that targets the phytopathogen Pseudomonas syringae pv. actinidiae. Journal of Biological Chemistry. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1016/j.jbc.2025.110224 Journal - Research Article

Hodgkinson-Bean, J., Ayala, R., Jayawardena, N., Rutter, G. L., Watson, B. N. J., Mayo-Muñoz, D., … Fineran, P. C., … Bostina, M. (2025). Global structural survey of the flagellotropic myophage φTE infecting agricultural pathogen Pectobacterium atrosepticum. Nature Communications, 16, 3257. doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-58514-x Journal - Research Article

McLeod, M., Morgaine, K., Fineran, P., Priest, P., & Jackson, S. (2024, August). Developing phage therapies for carbapenem-resistant acinetobacter baumannii and exploring public acceptance. Verbal presentation at the BMS Postgraduate Symposium, Dunedin, New Zealand. Conference Contribution - Verbal presentation and other Conference outputs

Harding, K. R., Malone, L. M., Kyte, N. A. P., Jackson, S. A., Smith, L. M., & Fineran, P. C. (2024). Genome-wide identification of bacterial genes contributing to nucleus-forming jumbo phage infection. Nucleic Acids Research. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1093/nar/gkae1194 Journal - Research Article

Wang, X., Jowsey, W. J., Cheung, C.-Y., Smart, C. J., Klaus, H. R., Seeto, N. E. J., Waller, N. J. E., … Fineran, P. C., Cook, G. M., Jackson, S. A., & McNeil, M. B. (2024). Whole genome CRISPRi screening identifies druggable vulnerabilities in an isoniazid resistant strain of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Nature Communications, 15, 9791. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-54072-w Journal - Research Article

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