Welcome — Lamason Lab

Rickettsia (green) infected cells - nuclei (purple) and mitochondria (gold)

Rickettsia (red) moving through host cells with long actin tails (green)

Motile Listeria (blue bacteria, red actin tails) spreading through a host monolayer with long membrane protrusions marked in green (plasma membrane)

Infectious focus of spreading bacteria (red, plasma membrane; green, bacteria; blue, nuclei)

mechanisms of HOst-Pathogen Interactions

In the Lamason lab, we investigate how intracellular bacterial pathogens such as Rickettsia parkeri and Listeria monocytogenes hijack host cell processes to promote infection. We use cellular, molecular, genetic, biochemical, and biophysical approaches to elucidate the mechanisms of host-pathogen interactions in order to reveal key insights into pathogenesis and host cell biology.

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RECENT Lab News

April 21, 2025: New review is out, with first author Patrick Woida highlighting the fascinating ways pathogenic bacteria reroute membrane trafficking. Check it out!

March 21, 2025: Congratulations to Ruth Hanna for completing her Master’s degree in Biology!

January 7, 2025: The final version of our paper investigating a novel interaction between Rickettsia parkeri and the rough ER is out in the Journal of Cell Biology today!

December 19, 2024: UROP Clara Zhu was just awarded the Cathy Comeau (1987) Memorial Fund for her phenomenal work in the lab. Way to go Clara!

December 14, 2024: Hannah KM and Becky both gave talks at this year's annual ASCB meeting in sunny San Diego. We had many great interactions with other cell biologists and folks interested in host-pathogen interactions.

December 13, 2024: We got a grant! Thanks to the School of Science and the William Bowman (1944) Fund for funding exciting new directions in the lab studying T4SS structural biology.

December 4, 2024: Welcome to our newest postdoc, Jane Lodwick! Jane did her PhD in Minglei Zhoa’s lab at the University of Chicago and will apply her expertise in structural biology to study Rickettsia parkeri.

November 13, 2024: The final version of Cassandra Vondrak’s first author paper is online at Infection and Immunity describing the interaction between the effector Sca4 and clathrin. The editor also selected her paper as an “Article of significant interest”. Congrats!!

September 3, 2024: Today, we welcomed Elayne Fivenson to the lab! Elayne did her PhD in Tom Bernhardt’s lab at Harvard and will pursue her postdoc training with us, focusing on Rickettsia parkeri biology.

August 12, 2024: Welcome to our newest lab member, Hannah Heller, who will be completing her PhD training with us!

July 30, 2024: The third and final PhD. defense of 2024 is in the books! Dr. Cassandra Vondrak defended a fantastic thesis today (and has the sword to prove it!).

July 19, 2024: The final version of our paper using BONCAT to identify rickettsia secreted effectors has been published at Nature Communications!

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