Farhad Javi joins the lab as a Postdoctoral Fellow. He will be working on using microfluidics to investigate bacterial interactions with flows. Welcome, Farhad!

Brennen Wise gave a poster presentation on his work at the Four Corners Meeting of the American Physical Society at Northern Arizona University.

Shabduli was awarded the Biodesign Student Travel Grant, which will support her travel to Cancun, Mexico, where she will present her research at the BLAST XVIII Conference.

Shabduli got a scholarship to attend the BLAST XVIII Conference in-person at Cancun, Mexico in January 2025.

Shajeda Begum joins the lab as a rotation graduate student. She will be working on characterization of flagellar stators. Welcome, Shajeda!

Our newest preprint describes a novel and interesting form of bacterial surface motility in E. coli and Salmonella. In a colloboration with the Blair Lab at the University of Utah, we show flagellar propulsion is dispensable for surface motility of these species, and, instead, movement is driven by osmotic flows and fermentation. Check out the preprint on bioRxiv.

Brennen Wise presented a poster and Seiga Yanagisawa gave a research talk at the annual Center for Mechanisms of Evolution retreat at the Phoenix Zoo.

Prasanth Manohar from Ry Young’s lab at Texas A&M University visits our lab for two weeks for a collaborative project. He will be investigating the effect of Lambdoid phage S21 infection on E. coli proton motive force. Welcome Prasanth!

Frances Fuguy wrapped up her studies at ASU and will be joining NAU this fall for a PhD program in Microbiology. We sent her off with a lab lunch at Postinos.

Congratulations, Frances. We will miss you in the Wadhwa Lab.

Luis Meneses and Seiga Yanagisawa presented insights from their research at the weekly BII-MCE (Biological Integration Institute for Mechanisms of Cellular Evolution) seminar series.

Frances Fuguy defended her Honros thesis on her work with biofilms. She studied how amino acid starvation affects biofilm formation in E. coli.

We participated in ASU’s Open Door 2024 which invites people from the local community to engage in fun science activities and demonstrations. Our lab led two activities, drawing with colourful bacteria and watching swimming bacteria under a foldscope. We got an amazing response with 103 agar plates streaked with visitors’ creations.

Open Door highlights

Navish and Shabduli presented posters at the GRC STIM Meeting held at Ventura, CA in January 2024.

Pranav Sharma joins the lab as a Lab Aide. Welcome, Pranav!

Seiga Yanagisawa joins the lab as a Postdoctoral Fellow. Welcome, Seiga!

The lab went on a hiking retreat at South Mountain to celebrate the end of the year. We had a fun scientific activity once we made it through Fat Man’s Pass and then enjoyed a variety of delicious pizzas at Pizzeria Bianco.

Eric Dudebout and Shabduli Sawant presented insights from their research at the weekly BII-MCE (Biological Integration Institute for Mechanisms of Cellular Evolution) seminar series.

Brennen Wise joins the lab as an undergraduate researcher. Brennen is a biophysics major at Barrett, The Honors College. He will be studying stator dynamics of the bacterial flagellar motor.

Rekha Joshi and Bibek Gyawali join the lab as rotation graduate students. Welcome!

Our lab received the BII-MCE seed grant to carry out a project titled “Evolutionary relationships between rotary molecular motor structures and performance”. This will be a collaborative project with the Frasch lab.

David Castillo joins the lab as a Research Scientist. In addition to driving his own projects, David will oversee and support all research projects within the lab. Welcome, David!

Shabduli won an award for presenting a poster on her work at BioPhest 2023. Congratulations, Shabduli!

Wadhwa Lab was well represented at the first post-covid BioPhest that took place on May 7, 2023. Shabduli, David Vandian, Eric, and Luis presented posters.

Rebecca Osar wrapped up her studies at ASU and will be joining Cornell this fall for a PhD program in Physics. We sent her off with a lab dinner at Cafe Lalibela.

Congratulations, Rebecca. We will miss you in the Wadhwa Lab.

Shabduli, Frances, Eric, Rebecca, and Luis presented posters at the annual retreat of ASU’s Biodesign Institute.

Rebecca won the Department of Physics Research Award for 2023. Congratulations, Rebecca!

Carolina Gogerty joins the lab as a Research Specialist. Before joining us, Carolina was a Research Technician at the DNASU Plasmid Repository. Carolina will help run day-to-day operations and support all research projects within the lab. Welcome, Carolina!

Frances Faguy joins the lab as an undergraduate researcher. Frances is a microbiology major at Barrett, The Honors College. She will assist Shabduli on studying the interactions of bacteria with surfaces.

David Vandian joins the lab as an undergraduate researcher. David is a triple major in Molecular Biosciences & Biotechnology, Physics, and Linguistics. He will work on quantifying the effect of biochemical perturbations on bacterial swimming motility.

Our new preprint describes the structure and mechanism of sodium-driven stator units from the bacterium Vibrio alginolyticus. This work, led by Haidai Hu in Nicholas Taylor’s lab, solves the puzzle of how stator units select for specific ions (e.g., sodium ions vs protons). Check out the preprint on bioRxiv.

Luis Meneses joins the lab as its first Lab Assistant. Luis is a Biosciences major with a concentration in Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior. Luis will help us get the lab up and running while also conducting independent research projects. Welcome, Luis!

Shabduli has received the Fulton Fellowship from the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering. This fellowship recognizes “your extraordinary achievements and in support of your future research.” Congratulations, Shabduli!

Rebecca Osar and Eric Dudebout join the lab as undergraduate researchers. Rebecca is a senior majoring in Physics and Eric is a junior majoring in Biochemistry. Welcome!

Our latest work is now published in Nature Communications. We carried out a detailed first-passage-time analysis of stator remodeling dynamics and show that mechanosensitive remodeling of the bacterial flagellar motor is a a multi-state dynamic process. Check out the paper on Nature Communications website.

Shabduli Sawant has accepted the offer to join the Wadhwa lab as its first graduate student, starting in January 2023. Welcome, Shabduli!

We are live! Navish starts his new position as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics and the Biodesign Center for Mechanisms of Evolution at Arizona State University.

Excited to share our new work, conducted in collaboration with Alberto Sassi and Yuhai Tu, on the dynamics of mechano-adaptation in the bacterial flagellar motor. We performed a detailed statistical analysis of the single binding and unbinding events that enable the flagellar motor to adapt to changes in mechanical load by remodeling its stator. We propose a minimal model consisting of four stator unit states that quantitatively explains multiple features of the experimental data and allows us to determine the transition rates between all four states. Check out the preprint on bioRxiv.

I was selected as an Associate Fellow of the Intersections Science Fellows Symposium. I feel lucky to be included in this wonderful group of scholars who are not only doing cutting-edge research but also making a positive impact on academic culture. Read more here.

Happy to share our new review on the machinery and mechanisms of bacterial motility, published online in Nature Reviews Microbiology. Check out the paper here.

Excited to share our new review on how the stator complex of the bacterial flagellar motor generates torque, published online in Trends in Biochemical Sciences. This effort was spearheaded by Haidai Hu, with contributions from Mònica Santiveri, Howard Berg, Marc Erhardt, and Nicholas Taylor. Check out the paper here.

I gave a virtual talk titled “The bacterial flagellar engine has an automatic gearshift” at the Physics of Living Systems Seminar Series. Thanks to Alex Persat for the kind invitation. The slides used for the talk can be found here.

I gave a virtual talk titled “The bacterial flagellar engine has an automatic gearshift” at the Microscale Ocean Biophysics Seminar Series. Thanks to Marco Polin for the invitation. The slides used for the talk can be found here.

Our latest on the mechanosensitive remodeling of the flagellar motor is out in PNAS. We show that mechano-adaptation in the bacterial flagellar motor is independent of its direction of rotation. Check out the paper on PNAS website.

I gave a talk titled “Does the bacterial flagellar motor have an automatic gearshift?” at the 2021 APS March meeting. The talk was delivered virtually and can be viewed through the meeting website, in the session Y12 Physics of Emergent Protein-Complex Assemblies. The slides used for the talk can be found here.

I am very excited to share this new piece from my postdoc research. We spun bacteria with ultrafast rotating electric fields to learn about how the flagellar motor unbuilds and rebuilds itself. Check out the preprint on bioRxiv.

I received a five year K99/R00 award from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences at the NIH. This award will provide me with two years of funding for postdoctoral research and three years of funding for my future independent laboratory. I am very grateful to the NIH for the support.