The bioprotection research core (BPRC - http://bioprotection.org.nz/about-us/) has awarded our group with two grants:
1) One summer student scholarship plus consumables (Christian Stocks will keep supporting our lab :) Yeah!)
2) a kickstarter to collaborate with Mark Hurst from AgResearch to do some awesome single-cell studies on Yersinia as a pathogen for insect pests.

Rudolf and Michal both received travel awards from the New Zealand society for microbiology to attend the annual meeting 2019 in Palmerston North.
The RE-lab will be represented by them, Simisola Oso and Moritz Miebach.

Well that was a lot of fun! Paula started her career as Prof. Emerita with a bang that is shaking the establishment of the Rhodococcus fascians community. In her most recent study, she argues that "the trick with the cytokinin mix" does not hold. Instead, methylated cytokinins are more likely to be the sole causal agents for fasciation.
In other news - Williamsia spp. may also be able to cause fasciation in plants - here we show first evidence for this.

Congrats to Paula for this wonderful piece!

Article can be found here:
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpls.2019.00674/abstract

Emmanuel's and Sophie van Hamelsveld's (Postgrad of Prof. Jack Heinemann) first lead author paper was published:
Prevalence of antibiotic resistant Escherichia coli isolated from urban and agricultural streams in Canterbury, New Zealand
Sophie van Hamelsveld, Muyiwa E Adewale, Brigitta Kurenbach, William Godsoe, Jon S Harding,  Mitja N P Remus-Emsermann, and  Jack A Heinemann

It is a very concerning find that we could detect ciprofloxacin resistant bacteria in our urban rivers.

Congrats to all co-authors

For some reason I missed that the final version of Simi's paper is now available https://academic.oup.com/femsle/article/366/6/fnz061/5420820 looks really nice in its final version - again congrats Simi!

Alright, here we go:
1) congrats to each Michal and Simi for having their first first-authorship accepted! 2) Congrats to Rudolf to get a bio-protocol accepted AND 3) congrats to Rudolf and Mo to get their review paper accepted, which is also Mo's first published paper ever!!!

I have a great group! Congrats y'all!

The review manuscript's uncorrected proofs are available online here already: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jare.2019.03.003
Our review investigates factors that impact bacterial colonisation on leaves and highlights the potential role of plant immunity in leaf colonisation.

More about the other papers when they are available online.
Puh... 

So first let me say - all my students are great (micro)biologists! But there is this one guy that doesn't seem to be satisfied with being a good biologist. Rudolf apparently has some time to spare to also aspire to become the World's best baker (as you can see he also has two price certificates as proof now). Not only did his cake look gorgeous, it also tasted amazing.

Congratulations to winning two prices here Ru!

Also in the news, I am proud to announce that I just got the confirmation that my promotion application was accepted and that I am now a Senior Lecturer - maybe comparable to a recently promoted Associate Professor in the US system.

​Thanks to everyone that helped me on that way. 

First off all, the Chromatic bacteria are now accepted with Frontiers (time to pay the open access bill :P ). Secondly, this happened:

Rudolf has won a poster award at the NZMS / NZSBMB annual meeting in Dunedin!

Way to go Rudolf!!!

Congratulations again - well deserved!