Sasa Jegorov

Fernando Noriega

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Florida International University; College of Arts, Sciences & Education; Florida, US Our collaboration with Prof. Fernando Noriega focuses on the molecular and hormonal regulation of insect reproduction and development, with a particular emphasis on juvenile hormone and ecdysteroid signaling pathways. Together, we combine advanced bioanalytical mass-spectrometry-based approaches with molecular biology and functional genomics to quantify, … Read more

Brian Sedio

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The University of Texas at Austin; Texas, US Our collaboration with Dr. Brian Sedio focuses on plant chemical diversity and induced defense responses, particularly the metabolic variation underlying plant–herbivore interactions. By integrating chemical ecology, metabolomics, and evolutionary perspectives, we investigate how plants modulate both volatile and non-volatile metabolites in response to herbivory across related species. … Read more

Simon Segar

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Harper Adams University; Agriculture and Environment; UK Our collaboration with Dr. Simon T. Segar focuses on tropical plant–insect interactions and community-level drivers of herbivory, with an emphasis on how plant defensive traits shape insect herbivore diversity and structure. By combining field-based ecological research, chemical ecology, and metabolomic analyses, we investigate multitrophic interactions across environmental gradients … Read more

Nicole van Dam

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Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops; DE Our collaboration with Prof. Dr. Nicole van Dam centers on the chemical ecology of plant–insect interactions, with a focus on how plant chemical diversity shapes herbivore behavior, performance, and ecological interactions. By integrating metabolomics and advanced chemical profiling with ecological and evolutionary frameworks, we investigate how genetic … Read more

Agata Kaczmarek

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Museum and Institute of Zoology; Witold Stefański Institute of Parasitology; Warsaw, PL Our laboratory is collaborating with Prof. Agata Kaczmarek (Witold Stefański Institute of Parasitology, Warsaw, Poland) on a Polish–Czech project exploring how dietary fatty acids can shape innate immune responses to fungal infections, with particular emphasis on the opportunistic pathogen Conidiobolus coronatus. As fungal … Read more

Fatty Acid–Driven Immune Modulation in Antifungal Host Defence

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Czech Science Foundation, No. 26-19900L (2026-2028) Research partners: Agata Kaczmarek; Witold Stefański Institute of Parasitology; Warsaw, PL This Polish–Czech collaborative project investigates how dietary fatty acids modulate immune responses to fungal infections, with a particular focus on infections caused by the opportunistic pathogen Conidiobolus coronatus. Fungal infections pose an increasing threat to human and animal health, exacerbated … Read more

New International Grant on Nutritional Immunology and Fungal Infections

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We are pleased to announce a new Polish–Czech collaborative research grant focused on understanding how dietary fatty acids modulate immune responses to fungal infections. The project uses the wax moth Galleria mellonella as a well-established alternative infection model with strong relevance to mammalian innate immunity. The main goal of the project is to determine whether fatty acid supplementation can enhance host … Read more

New GAČR Project: Metabolic Energy Substrates in Avian Blood

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Our laboratory is a co-investigator in the newly funded Czech Science Foundation project 26-22858S, led by MVDr. Oldřich Tomášek, Ph.D. from the Institute of Vertebrate Biology, Czech Academy of Sciences (IVB). The project team also includes collaborators from the Faculty of Science, Charles University. The project, “Metabolic energy substrates in avian blood: sources of variation, … Read more

New Review Publication on Insect Hormone Quantification and Manipulation

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We are pleased to highlight a new collaborative review published in Current Opinion in Insect Science, co-authored with colleagues Fernando G. Noriega, Guy Bloch, Martin Moos, Petr Šimek, and Marek Jindra. The article, “Approaches to quantify and manipulate insect hormone signals,” provides an up-to-date overview of state-of-the-art methods used to study the key lipidic insect … Read more

New Collaborative Publication with the Algatech Centre: Cyanophycinase as a Key Regulator of Heterotrophy in Cyanobacteria

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We are proud to share a new joint publication arising from our long-term collaboration with Roman Sobotka’s research group at the Algatech Centre (Institute of Microbiology, CAS). The study reveals a previously unknown role of cyanophycinase (CphB) in enabling heterotrophic growth in the model cyanobacterium Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803.

The Algatech team discovered that deleting the cphB gene completely blocks light-activated heterotrophic growth. To uncover the metabolic basis of this phenotype, our laboratory contributed targeted LC-HRMS metabolomics, which showed that CphB is essential for activating arginine biosynthesis and for maintaining a balanced carbon–nitrogen and nucleotide metabolism during the transition from photosynthesis to heterotrophy.

Together, the teams demonstrated that CphB interacts with the key arginine-pathway enzyme ArgD and stimulates cyanophycin degradation, revealing a tightly coordinated metabolic system unique to cyanobacteria.