At the GenIE lab, we study why some newcomers, whether mobile genetic elements or bacterial strains, succeed in microbial communities while others fail. We focus on antibiotic resistance, using resistance plasmids and their bacterial hosts as our main experimental systems. The same questions apply to microbial communities in people, animals, food and the environment.
We combine experimental microbiology, genomics and quantitative ecology to understand what determines invasion success and to predict when communities are likely to resist new arrivals.
We are based at IPLA-CSIC in Oviedo, Spain.
What makes an invader successful?
The properties that let some plasmids and bacterial strains establish and spread, and how they keep adapting once they arrive.
How does the community shape invasion?
How interactions with resident species make the same invader succeed in one community and fail in another.
Can invasion outcomes be predicted?
Ecological models that look for general principles behind invasion outcomes, and for the cases where those principles break down.
Selected Publications
Pagani L*#, León-Sampedro R*#, et al
Nature Microbiology
Leon-Sampedro R, et al
Nature Microbiology
Leon-Sampedro R#, et al
Nature Communications
Alonso-Del Valle A, León-Sampedro R, et al
Nature Communications
