Department of Microbiology at UMass Amherst

Start up company, Latde Diagnostics, won $50,000 in innovation grant funding at the Lever Western Massachusetts Health Tech Challenge hosted by the Institute for Applied Life Sciences (IALS) on March 3. Sloan Siegrist, Associate Professor Microbiology, founded Latde Diagnostics along with Emily Melzer. Melzer received her Ph.D. from UMass Microbiology under the guidance of Sloan Siegrist. Latde Diagnostics is developing a rapid, low-cost test to determine which specific antibiotic will be effective in a patient with sepsis, a life-threatening blood-borne infection.

Yasu Morita, Associate Professor of Microbiology, was awarded a two-year grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to support research aimed at developing new and more effective treatments for tuberculosis (TB). Morita studies mycobacteria, a group of bacteria that is omnipresent in the soil and environment. Several species of mycobacteria cause disease, the most well-known of which is TB. After years of study spearheaded by Ph.D. candidate Ian Sparks, Morita and his team have focused in on the glycolipids located on the cell surface, which help to maintain the stability of the cell membrane.

Wilmore Webley, Associate Professor Microbiology, will serve as the inaugural Senior Vice Provost for Equity and Inclusion effective January 1, 2023. UMass Amherst Provost and Senior Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Tricia Serio announced the appointment of two new senior leaders for diversity, equity and inclusion for Academic Affairs. The other appointment is Sofiya Alhassan who will serve as the Graduate School’s new associate dean for inclusion and engagement.

Peter Nguyen, an undergraduate researcher in Yasu Morita's lab, was first author on a paper which reported the lab's study exploring the conditions for and effects of acylation. Lab members noticed that membrane fluidization led two membrane glycolipids (lipids with a carbohydrate attached via glycosidic bond) called phosphatidylinositol mannosides, or PIMs, to undergo acylation. The findings were recently published in the Journal of Lipid Research and were highlighted in the December issue of the ASBMB Today magazine.