Dr. Julie Thomas is an Assistant Professor in the Thomas H. Gosnell School of Life Sciences (GSoLS) at Rochester Institute of Technology (Associate Professor effective at the beginning of the 2020-21 academic year). Dr. Thomas joined RIT after completing post-doctoral fellowships in bacterial viruses (phages) at the University of Maryland Baltimore and the University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio. Phage research is currently of great interest due to their potential for the control of multi-drug resistant pathogens. A major roadblock to the safe and efficient use of phages for therapy, and other biocontrol and biotechnological applications, is the large amount of genetic “dark matter” (functionally uncharacterized genes) that collectively phages have.

Dr. Thomas’s research program addresses this knowledge gap by focusing on an unusually large (so-called “giant”) phage which infects Salmonella Typhimurium, a major food-borne pathogen. The lab has developed a genetic system for this phage which allows it to be a model for related giant phages that have been isolated around the globe for clinical and agricultural biocontrol applications (and for which there is no amenable host genetic system). The lab combines genetics with genomics, proteomics, structural and molecular analyses to define how giant phages replicate and interact with their host bacteria. Their research is supported by NIGMS (National Institute of General Medicine Sciences)