Program Highlights

Dr. Raymond J. Turner is a multi-ethnic multi-generational Canadian. Academic career began with a B.Sc. in Biochemistry/Chemistry followed by a Ph.D. in Biophysical Chemistry. Post-Doctoral training was obtained in Clinical Microbiology and Molecular Microbiology. In 1998, he was recruited to the University of Calgary and is presently appointed as Faculty Professor of Science. He has lectured in chemistry, microbiology, biochemistry and environmental science courses from introductory biology to graduate courses. Through his career he has been part of developing a variety of new and novel courses as well as contributing to developing an international genomics program as well as contributing to an AMR course. He has held the post as Associate Department Head and Graduate program director and chair of various research cluster units. He has also served on Dean’s and Vice-presidents’ advisory committees as well as director of the Calgary Biofilm Research group. Research funding from the Canadian funding councils of NSERC, CIHR, Genome Canada, MITACS as well as a number of industrial partners. He has received awards of excellence in research and in graduate student supervision and recognitions for undergraduate lecturing from the University of Calgary. He actively seeks and generates national and international collaborations.  From this has received several Faculty Fellowship awards from the Institute of Advanced studies (Italy) and formal recognition of contribution from the Italian Microbiology Society.  As a Microbial Biochemist, research interests are multidisciplinary from fields of environmental and molecular microbiology, bioinorganic chemistry, metallomics, and nanotechnology. The Turner research group studies biochemical resistance mechanisms of bacteria towards various stressors (metals, pollutants, antiseptics). This knowledge is applied to biotechnology approaches for bioremediation, green synthesis of nanomaterials and development of novel antimicrobials.

Dr. Cox is an Associate Professor and holds a Canada Research Chair in antimicrobial resistance (AMR) within Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology at the University of Guelph (Ontario, Canada). Dr. Cox’s training has centered on studying and combating antibiotic resistant pathogenic bacteria. She has nearly 20 years of experience studying AMR in microbial pathogens, building a strong foundation through work in laboratories renowned for their research into multidrug-resistant pathogens. She completed her PhD at the University of Leeds (United Kingdom), postdoctoral training with Dr. Gerry Wright at McMaster University (Hamilton, Canada), and started her own research group in 2017 at the University of Guelph. Dr. Cox’s current research program explores complex aspects of bacterial physiology in combination with cutting-edge drug discovery endeavors to ultimately combat pathogenic bacteria. Specifically, Dr. Cox and her group are exploring novel approaches to control bacterial infections by investigating and inhibiting bacterial adhesion to the host. Her lab also studies drug efflux pumps, to gain insight into the substrate specificities, physiological functions, and origins of these transporters, which will inform future drug discovery efforts and antibiotic stewardship.

Dr. Rabia Fatima is a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Medicine at McMaster University. She completed her BSc in Biochemistry before joining Dr. Alexander Hynes’ lab as an MSc student, later transferring into the PhD program in Biochemistry. Her doctoral research focused on exploring the therapeutic potential of temperate bacteriophages—viruses that can integrate into bacterial genomes and remain dormant—when combined with antibiotics. This work significantly advanced our understanding of how temperate phages can be leveraged as adjuvants in the treatment of multi-drug-resistant bacterial infections, expanding their clinical relevance. Following her PhD, her research has evolved to investigate the role of dormant phages in fungal-bacterial interactions during co-infection.

I joined the Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique (INRS) as an Assistant Professor of Microbiology in January 2025. I first studied plant biology and ecology during my undergraduate studies at McGill and my master's degree at the University of Sherbrooke. I became interested in the ecology and evolution of plant-microbe associations during my PhD at UQAM, where I focused on the phyllosphere (i.e., the surface of plant leaves) as a study system. After three years at the Montreal Botanical Garden, my lab has now moved to the Centre Armand-Frappier Santé Biotechnologies of INRS where we pursue research on the forms and functions of leaf and root microbial symbioses. Alongside my research activities, I am particularly motivated by initiatives that bring researchers and citizens closer together.

Dr. Terrence Bell is a soil microbiologist and ecologist. He first worked as a faculty member at The Pennsylvania State University from 2017-2022 and has since worked as an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto - Scarborough in the Department of Physical and Environmental Sciences. He held postdoctoral fellowships at l’Université de Montréal and Cornell University, after earning his B.Sc.H. from Queen’s University, his M.Sc. from Western University, and his Ph.D. from McGill University. His work explores the constraints on microbial niche breadth and the extent to which niche breadth can be modified by new environmental pressures. This research has fundamental implications for microbial biogeography, as well as the fitness and functional costs of different types of generalism. It also has numerous applications, including microbial product development, the limits of directed evolution for biotechnology, and the detection and management of microbial invasions.

Website: https://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/labs/microbiomemanipulationlab/

Dr. Joe Schwarcz is Director of McGill University’s “Office for Science and Society” which has the mission of separating sense from nonsense. He is the recipient of numerous awards for teaching chemistry and for interpreting science for the public. He was the first non-American to win the American Chemical Society’s prestigious Grady-Stack award for popularizing chemistry. “Dr Joe” has hosted a radio show on science for forty-three years, has appeared hundreds of times on television, writes a regular newspaper column and is the author of nineteen best-sellers. He has been awarded four honorary doctorates and teaches a course on “Food and Nutrition” that with 2700 students holds the record for the largest enrolment for any university course in Canada. Professor Schwarcz is also an amateur magician, often spicing up his presentations with a little magic. 

Dr. Sébastien Arcand is a full professor at HEC Montréal, co-director of the research chair on demo linguistics and language policies in Québec, and associate director of the Pôle sports at HEC Montréal. He is interested in the management of ethnocultural diversity within institutions and organizations, socio-economic inequalities in sports practices, and the socio-professional integration difficulties faced by people from immigrant backgrounds. He has sat on the OQLF's Comité de suivi sur l'évolution de la langue française and Statistics Canada's Advisory Committee on Language Statistics. He frequently advises managers on intercultural management practices in Quebec, Europe and Latin America (Colombia), and has collaborated on reports for various local, national and international organizations. He is one of the “100 most influential academics in government” in the British organization Apolitical, Employement and skills section for 2021.

Dr. Emilia Liana Falcone is the Director of the Microbiome and Mucosal Defense Research Unit, and the IRCM Post-COVID-19 Research Clinic (IPCO) at the Montreal Clinical Research Institute (IRCM). She is an Associate Research Professor at IRCM, an Associate Clinical Professor in the Department of Medicine at Université de Montréal, and holds a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in the Role of the Microbiome in Inborn Errors of Immunity and Post-Infectious Conditions.  During the pandemic, she established the IRCM Post-COVID-19 (IPCO) research clinic, the first clinic of its kind in Quebec, and has since evaluated hundreds of individuals with long COVID while elucidating the role of the microbiota in driving the immune dysregulation underlying this post-infectious condition. In addition to leading a fundamental and translational research program centered on inborn errors of immunity and post-infectious conditions, Dr. Falcone is an attending physician in the Department of Infectious Diseases at the Centre Hospitalier the l’Université de Montréal (CHUM), has served as a subject matter expert on several provincial and federal initiatives, including the Chief Science Advisor’s Task Force on Post-COVID-19 Condition and being invited twice to the House of Commons of Canada. She is the content chair for the Canadian Guidelines for Post-COVID-19 Condition - Diagnosis Guideline Team, she co-chaired Canada’s first long COVID research symposium, she is co-President of the Research Committee for the Quebec Network for Complex Diseases, and is the lead microbiome investigator for the Primary Immune Deficiency Treatment Consortium (PIDTC).

Dr. Souradet Shaw is an Assistant Professor at the Institute for Global Public Health in the Department of Community Health Sciences at the University of Manitoba. He holds a Canada Research Chair in Program Science and Global Public Health (Tier II). Souradet is a social epidemiologist focussing on sexually transmitted and bloodborne infections, with research projects in Manitoba, Colombia, India, Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Kenya.

Delphine Douillet is a Senior Genomics Specialist at Illumina, where she applies her expertise and in-depth knowledge of the genomics landscape in Canada to promote the adoption of cutting-edge technologies by researchers and clinicians. Holding a PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Bordeaux, Delphine's research background spans chemo-genetic interactions in cancer biology and epigenetics, with her postdoctoral work at Northwestern University in Chicago published in Nature Genetics. She joined Illumina in 2019 as a Field Applications Scientist, helping customers adopt next-generation sequencing technologies, fostering advancements in genomic research and its clinical applications.

Cameron Davidson-Pilon is a bad statistician turned even worse hardware engineer. CEO/Founder of Pioreactor. Former Director of Data Science at Shopify. Cameron's background includes mathematics, statistics, computer science (topics blogged at dataorigami.net) and food science (topics blogged at controlledmold.com) . He is the author of "Bayesian Methods for Hackers". Cameron now explores the biology through the perspective of computers and data.

Eammon MacNeil, M.Sc., is a Product Manager and Territory Sales Manager at Scintica Instrumentation. With a background in biomedical sciences from Queen’s University and expertise in ion channel modulation and neuroendocrine secretion, he brings a strong scientific foundation to support researchers in advancing anaerobic and low-oxygen cell culture applications.

Dylan is a Scientific Communications Specialist with SRI International, focusing on the BioCyc Genomic Database Collection and Pathway Tools software. With a background as a nanomaterials chemist at the University of Calgary, and a subsequent focus on commercializing novel research in robotics, drug development, and bioinformatics, he specializes in translating complex scientific and computational concepts into clear, compelling communications that support discovery, data interpretation, and interdisciplinary collaboration. Leveraging his history with both industry and academia, Dylan helps bridge the gap between innovative tools like BioCyc and the researchers who use them. He excels at crafting products, services, and materials that resonate with technical audiences, from grant reviewers and PIs to biotech decision-makers and cross-disciplinary teams. By connecting researchers with tools that can make their workflows more efficient and reliable, Dylan aims to help advance innovation in key sectors.

Dr. Dao Nguyen is a clinician scientist at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre, and Associate professor in Medicine at McGill University. She is the founding director of the McGill AMR Centre and the lead of AMRQ, an emerging network on antimicrobial resistance in Quebec. She has been a recipient of the Burroughs Wellcome Fund Career Award for Medical Scientist, Canadian Institutes of Health Research Clinician Scientist award, Fonds en Recherche Santé Québec Chercheur de Mérite award, Vertex Cystic Fibrosis Research Innovation Award among others. Her research bridges fundamental microbiology and translational research, focusing on respiratory bacterial infections and host pathogen interactions relevant to chronic infections in people with cystic fibrosis, as well as the biology of Pseudomonas aeruginosa and molecular mechanisms leading to antibiotic failure. She is also involved in collaborative interdisciplinary projects to develop rapid diagnostics for bacterial infections, discover novel anti-infective therapies and antimicrobial biomaterials.  

Dr. Landry obtained his BSc and MSc degrees from Université Laval (1995-2000). He trained as a PhD student at Harvard University (2001-2006) where he worked on the evolution of gene expression networks. He did a postdoctoral internship on the organization and evolution of protein interaction networks at Université de Montréal (2007-2009). Since 2009, he has been an independent investigator at Université Laval and now holds the CIHR Canada Research Chair in Cellular Systems and Synthetic Biology. He was elected to the inaugural cohort of the College of the Royal Society of Canada. In 2017, he received the NSERC E.W.R. Steacie Memorial Award for early-career researchers, and in 2020, he was awarded the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution Mid-Career Award for outstanding contributions. In 2021, he received the Université Laval Excellence Prize for teaching and mentoring graduate students and postdoctoral researchers. In 2024, he was awarded the Canada Gairdner Momentum Award for exceptional scientific research contributions with continued potential for impact on human health.

Prof. Lyle Whyte (Professor, McGill University; Member, McGill Space Institute) is a Canada Research Chair (Tier 1) in Polar Microbiology (2018-2025). His research program examines microbial biodiversity, activity, and ecology in polar ecosystems, especially permafrost and unique cold saline springs, in the emerging field of cryomicrobiology, the exploration of the low-temperature limits of microbial life. The utility of these unique cryoenvironments as analogs for astrobiology studies is also a key feature of his research program. Whyte completed his PhD at the University of Waterloo in 1992, following undergraduate studies at the University of Regina. From 1993 to 2002, he served as a Research Officer at the Biotechnology Research Institute, National Research Council of Canada in Montreal before joining McGill U. in 2003  He is presently a member of the European Space Agency ExoMars 2028 mission, the McGill Space Institute, and the Whyte is a member of the COSPARS Panel on Planetary Protection. 

Dr. Eduardo Rocha studied Chemical Engineering and Applied Maths,  did a PhD in Bioinformatics and an Habilitation in Biology. He is the director of the CNRS/Institut Pasteur UMR Genetics of Genomes, where he heads the Microbial Evolutionary Genomics lab since 2008. He is a Specialist in comparative genomics, in particular in the use of bioinformatics and biostatistics to study microbial evolution. His research aims at understanding how bacteria evolve, in respect to genome dynamics and phenotypic adaptation. In the last decade, his work has focused on the role of mobile genetic elements in shaping gene repertoires and in driving functional innovation. 

Antony T. Vincent is an Associate Professor in the Department of Animal Science at the Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences at Université Laval. His research focuses on the molecular mechanisms involved in the evolution of pathogenic agents in livestock, as well as bacteria responsible for food spoilage. He is particularly interested in the mobility of antibiotic resistance genes within the animal microbiome, the impact of genomic rearrangements on bacterial pathogenicity, and the interactions between bacteria and bacteriophages. His goal is to develop alternatives to antibiotics, such as the use of bacteriophages, and to optimize the animal microbiome in an environmentally responsible manner.

The research of the group of Charles M. Dozois is focussed on elucidation of bacterial host-pathogen interactions. He is particularly interested in identification and characterisation of bacterial systems and genes that are expressed in vivo during infection or host colonisation and discovery of novel virulence factors or mechanisms of bacterial survival and adaptation during infection. 

 Main areas of interest include: Bacterial gene regulation and adaptation during infection; vaccine development; Enterobacterial pathogens infecting humans and other animals; metal transport in bacterial pathogens including  Escherichia coli, Salmonella, et Klebsiella. 

Dr. Salim Timo Islam is an Associate Professor at the Centre Armand-Frappier Santé Biotechnologie of the INRS (Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique) in Laval, QC.  He first became interested in the bacterial cell surface during his Hon.BSc studies at the University of Toronto through work with mycobacterial lipids in the lab of Dr. Jun Liu.  This interest continued through PhD studies on O-antigen biosynthesis in Pseudomonas aeruginosa at the University of Guelph in the lab of Dr. Joe Lam.  This was followed by postdoctoral research at the CNRS-Laboratory of Bacterial Chemistry in Marseille, France in the group of Dr. Tâm Mignot studying the myxobacterial gliding motility machinery.  Since opening his lab at the INRS, his team has been using predatory Myxococcus xanthus as a model system to probe a range of fundamental bacterial processes including polysaccharide secretion, motility, outer-membrane dynamics, and kin recognition.

Christopher Fernandez-Prada, DVM, PhD is an Associate Professor of Parasitology in the Department of Pathology and Microbiology at the Université de Montréal’s Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, where he also directs the Animal Parasitology Diagnostic Laboratory. An adjunct professor at McGill and Laval Universities, Dr. Fernandez-Prada leads a multidisciplinary program on antimicrobial resistance, extracellular vesicle biology, and host-parasite interactions in Leishmania and other neglected zoonotic pathogens. His team combines molecular parasitology, multi-omics integration, and advanced approaches to uncover drug-resistance mechanisms and develop One-Health-oriented diagnostics and interventions. His recent honors include the 2024 Vétoquinol Graduate Supervision Award, 2023 Canadian NTDs Outstanding Paper and Zoetis Research Awards, a 2022 Québec Science Top-10 Discovery, the 2021 CIHR Bhagirath Singh Early Career Award, and the 2018 Zoetis Innovation Award.

Dr. Jennifer Geddes-McAlister is the Canada Research Chair in the Proteomics of Fungal Disease in One Health, an Associate Professor in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology, and Director of the Bioinformatics Graduate Programs at the University of Guelph (Canada). Her research program applies mass spectrometry-based proteomics to investigate host-pathogen interactions with a focus on One Health (i.e., intersection of animal, human, and environmental health) approaches to overcoming fungal diseases. Her lab is making seminal contributions to understanding how fungal pathogens infect a host and how the host defends itself from infection, along with identifying novel protein-level drivers of antifungal resistance. Since beginning her lab in 2018, she has won six early career researcher awards in recognition of her scientific contributions, as well as an alumni achievement award from the University of Lethbridge (alma mater) and a mentorship award from the American Society of Mass Spectrometry. Dr. Geddes-McAlister is President of the Canadian National Proteomics Network, co-founder of the Canadian Artificial Intelligence and Mass Spectrometry for Systems Biology (CAN-AIMS) Consortium, and founder of ‘Moms in Proteomics’ an international initiative dedicated to recognizing and supporting mothers in STEM.

Dr. Emma Allen-Vercoe is a professor in the Department of Molecular Biology at the University of Guelph, and the Canada Research Chair in Human Gut Microbiome and Host Interactions.  Her research focuses on the microbial ecology of the human gut, and she runs a highly specialized laboratory equipped to culture the often extremely fastidious and anaerobic microbes found in the human microbiome, both axenically and as part of defined, complex communities (e.g. using bioreactor technology).  She was a contributor of many isolates to the Human Microbiome Project strain collection, and she participates in several ongoing efforts to standardize measurement of the microbiome.  Her research projects have been funded both nationally and internationally and include studies of the microbiome in Type 1 and 2 diabetes and colorectal cancer, the effects of dietary substrates on the gut microbiome, as well as more recent work to characterize the so-called VANISH (Volatile and/or Associated Negatively with Industrialized Societies of Humans) microbes of the Yanomami people of the Amazon.  Emma also has a long-standing interest in the biology and host interactions of Fusobacterium spp., and was part of the group that first recognized F. nucleatum as an ‘oncomicrobe’ in colorectal cancer.  When not trying to culture fastidious microbes, Emma likes to spend her time growing fastidious plants.

Frédéric Raymond has been a professor at the School of Nutrition at Université Laval since 2018. He is a researcher at the Nutrition, Health and Society Center (NUTRISS) and also a member of the Institute of Nutrition and Functional Foods (INAF) and the Intelligence and Data Institute. Professor Frédéric Raymond's research aims to understand how the intestinal microbiota transforms nutrients in the diet into metabolites that can affect metabolic and intestinal health. His laboratory combines microbiology approaches, studies of nutritional interventions in humans, and the use of artificial intelligence to better understand the complexities of the relationships between diet, the microbiota, and health.

Dr. Jesse Shapiro did his undergrad in Biology at McGill University, followed by an MSc in Integrative Bioscience at Oxford. He then completed a PhD in Computational and Systems Biology at MIT with Eric Alm, where he developed methods to detect signatures of natural selection, recombination, and speciation in bacterial genomes. He went on to a postdoc with Pardis Sabeti at the Broad Institute and Harvard University, where he studied the evolutionary genomics of Mycobacterium tuberculosis and Lassa virus. After seven years as Canada Research Chair in Microbial Evolutionary Genomics at Université de Montréal, he returned to McGill as an associate professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the Genome Centre.

Current research:
Jesse’s research uses genomics to understand the ecology and evolution of microbes, ranging from freshwater bacterioplankton to the human gut microbiome. His work has helped elucidate the origins of bacterial species, leading to a more unified species concept across domains of life, and has developed genome-wide association study (GWAS) methods tailored for bacteria. He is particularly interested in pathogen evolution, and their evolution within patients, and interactions with members of the resident microbiome. His laboratory currently has projects on the ecology and evolution of toxic cyanobacterial blooms, cholera infections, and antimicrobial resistance, among others.

My favorite scientific question is “how is parasitism a sustainable biological relationship?” I addressed this question through the study of various microbes, the human Epstein Barr virus (doctoral thesis at the École Normale Supérieure de Lyon and post doctorate at the Institut Gustave Roussy), protozoa parasites of bivalve molluscs (post doctorate at Ifremer), bacteria of the Vibrio genus pathogenic in oysters, shrimp or corals (Ifremer, Institut Pasteur in Paris, Harvard Medical School in Boston; Roscoff Biological Station) and more recently viruses which infect Vibrios, the bacteriophages.

Holder of the Canada Research Chair of Excellence “Eco-Evo-Patho of microbes in nature”, Full Professor at the University of Montreal since September 2023 and IVADO member, I aspire to create a team of enthusiasts, followers of “non-model” organizations, a diverse, equitable, inclusive and committed team to eco-responsible approaches.

Dr. Zhenyu Cheng is an Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Faculty of Medicine, Dalhousie University.

His lab has been focusing on the study of host-bacterial interactions. Dr. Cheng finished his undergraduate study in 2002 at Wuhan University in China. He then went to University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada to pursue his graduate studies. After obtaining his PhD degree in 2010, Dr. Cheng went to Boston for his postdoctoral position that is jointly appointed in the Department of Molecular Biology at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and the Department of Genetics at Harvard Medical School. During his postdoctoral training, Dr. Cheng received a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) Postdoctoral Fellowship and a Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Government of Canada, followed by a Tosteson Medical Discovery Award from Harvard Medical School. Dr. Cheng started his independent research lab at Dalhousie University since 2016. He is a recipient of Dalhousie President’s Research Excellence Awards for Emerging Investigators and Canadian Institutes of Health Research Bhagirath Singh Early Career Prize in Infection and Immunity. His CF-related research mainly focuses on the opportunistic bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa, particularly host inflammatory and stress signaling pathways modulated by bacteria-secreted proteases. In addition, the Cheng lab also characterize the antimicrobial resistance (AMR) mechanisms and strive to tackle the AMR issues.

Dr. Poulin-Laprade received her PhD in genetic regulation of horizontal gene transfer from the Université de Sherbrooke in 2015. A few months later, she began a postdoc at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada to build on her expertise in applied AMR by working on a pan-Canadian initiative in microbial genomics. In 2020, she was hired as a research scientist at AAFC's R&D centre in Sherbrooke. She has been an associate professor at Université de Sherbrooke since 2018, and at Université Laval since 2021. Her research program aims to acquire knowledge and develop approaches to improve the management of agroecosystems and swine production, limiting the spread of zoonotic pathogens and antimicrobial resistance in the farm-environment continuum. Dr Poulin-Laprade is also actively working to break down silos and advocating solutions to enable real integration of results from all One Health sectors.

Dr. Sylvain Moineau has been a Professor of Microbiology at the Faculty of Science and Engineering of the Université Laval (Québec, Canada) since 1996. His research focuses on phage biology and the interactions between phages and bacteria. His team investigates phage resistance mechanisms, such as CRISPR-Cas systems, to develop phage-resistant bacterial strains for food and dairy applications. He is also working on strategies to use phages as biocontrol agents in various industrial sectors and public health. Since 2011, he has held the Canada Research Chair in Bacteriophages, and since 2003, he has served as Curator of the Félix d’Hérelle Reference Center for Bacterial Viruses. Over the course of his career, he has received numerous academic honors, including the Killam Prize, the NSERC John C. Polanyi and Synergy Awards, and the Canadian Society of Microbiologists Murray Award. He has also been recognized with civil honors, including Officer of the Order of Canada and Officer of the National Order of Quebec. Prof. Moineau has supervised over 100 graduate students and post-doctoral fellows, published 280 research articles, authored 23 book chapters, gave 225 invited seminars, and holds 13 patents. According to Clarivate Analytics is among the most cited microbiologists for the past decade.

Isabelle Benoit Gelber is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biology at Concordia University and is affiliated to the Center for Structural and Functional Genomics and to the Centre for Applied Synthetic Biology, in Montreal. Her research combines fungal biology, genomics and applied synthetic biology to solve problems in sectors of health, energy and agriculture and forestry. The Benoit Gelber lab focuses on molecular mechanisms of fungal hypersecretion of protein and secondary metabolites. She holds a Ph.D. in Molecular Microbiology and Biotechnology done at the INRAe lab BBF and the CNRS lab AFMB in Marseille, France. She was a postdoctoral researcher at Utrecht University in the Microbiology group and at the Westerdijk Fungal Biodiversity Institute in the Fungal Physiology group in Utrecht, The Netherlands.

Dr Dufresne is an Assistant Professor within the Department of Biological Sciences at the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQÀM). During her PhD, she has trained on gene regulation for virulence of S. enterica serovar Typhi with Dr France Daigle (Université de Montréal). As a postdoc, she focused her training on pathogenesis of S. aureus in models mimicking the human vagina with Dr John McCormick (University of Western Ontario). She started her research group in September 2024. She centers her expertise on the study of bacterial gene regulation, bacterial interactions and pathogenesis in the context of women’s health.

Dr. Sadri ZNAIDI is a biochemist (B.Sc., M.Sc. from the Université de Sherbrooke) and molecular biologist (Ph.D., from the Université de Montréal), with expertise in yeast genetics and functional genomics. He is currently an Assistant Professor in Systems Biology in the Department of Biology at Memorial University of Newfoundland. He is also a Pasteur Network Affiliate Program fellow, with affiliations at the Pasteur Institutes in Tunis, Tunisia, and Paris, France.