Terence Crofts

Asst Prof @ACESIllinois
Microbiomes, antibiotic resistance, functional metagenomics

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

🚨New Crofts lab paper🚨

Functional metagenomic libraries let us study bacterial genes 🧫🧬 from microbiomes💩, even if they've never been annotated with a function before 📒. However, these libraries often require more metagenomic DNA than is available from some samples.

[Caterina Gratton @GrattonCaterina]

How can we acquire new knowledge and skills on a daily basis while remaining the same person?
I'm excited to share our new preprint led by @hyejinjadelee and @allydworetsky tackling this question, just in time for #OHBM2026
https://t.co/MHmMpQLGRk
🧵👇

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

And thanks to Lauren Quinn @lquinn_phd at the ACES News desk @ACESIllinois for her fantastic write-up of our paper!

https://t.co/UzqZQrZYtM

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

Why does this matter🤷‍♂️?

We think it is important to find resistance genes from other environments before they reach the clinic🏥or farm🐮. Functional metagenomics allows us to do this, and our method, by using less DNA more efficiently, opens up many new microbiome samples!

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

🙌Congrats to Hayden @haydenallm and Elizabeth for their co-first author publication and thanks to our collaborators Erica @ericamhartmann at Northwestern and Frank at the Shedd aquarium @shedd_aquarium (and to @ZymoResearch research for the sample human fecal material!)

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

Notably, simply sequencing metagenomic DNA would not have let us discover these functions, highlighting the importance of the *functional* aspect of functional metagenomic libraries in finding new resistance genes

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

🚨New Crofts lab paper🚨

Functional metagenomic libraries let us study bacterial genes 🧫🧬 from microbiomes💩, even if they've never been annotated with a function before 📒. However, these libraries often require more metagenomic DNA than is available from some samples.

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

With just ~30 and ~100 ng of DNA, both microbiomes gave good libraries!

We used antibiotic selections💊 to link unannotated❓MFS transporters from the aquarium to tetracycline resistance and a new acetyltransferase (we call it SatB) from the swab to streptothricin resistance.

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

We used our approach to tackle a pair of low biomass microbiomes that would usually be difficult to study via functional metagenomics: an aquarium microbiome🐟and a fecal swab💩.

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

We show that we can start with 10- to 100-fold ⬇️input metagenomic DNA (10s to 100s of nanograms) and still make ~gigabase libraries without needing to rely on potentially biasing DNA amplification.

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

We previously found that METa assembly libraries can be made with ⬆️efficiency than classic methods resulting in libraries containing 100s of gigabases of DNA.

Here, we answered 'what about making libraries from limited samples?' 🤏

https://t.co/ZRubLw1Kmj

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

We make🛠️these libraries via METa assembly (previous thread👇) using tagmentation to fragment DNA/add mosaic end tags on all fragments. This lets us use assembly cloning to *efficiently* ligate fragments into plasmids with a mosaic ends cloning site.

https://t.co/EK73oXZCPx

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

I am thrilled that my METa assembly paper with collaborators @ericamhartmann and @alexmcfarland_ is online now at @mSystemsJ:
https://t.co/Na6iDJTnYV

We show that functional metagenomic libraries (FMLs) can be made using 20-fold less DNA and with 80-fold greater efficiency

1/n

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

@baym Legionella?

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

@hailceezur @JMUChemistry Congrats Lindsay and team!

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

@baym @ACESIllinois @UofIllinois @FSUBiomed Yes! I'll take you to Art Mart or Bread Co, your choice 😆

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

🚨Personal/professional News👀! This summer the Crofts Micro lab is moving to Animal Sciences @ACESIllinois @UofIllinois

I'm sorry to leave my friends @FSUBiomed but thrilled to join this fantastic group of microbiologists and get our hands on some animal microbiomes! 🐮🐷🐔💩

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

We will be looking 👀for graduate students interested in applying our 100s of gigabases of functional metagenomic libraries to discover new genes from microbiomes!🔍🧫🦠

https://t.co/MJHZLU3URb

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

Happy #EURO2024 hot crossed buns day!

[Hensley Lab @SCOTTeHENSLEY]

The Microbiology Department at Penn is hiring Professors of all ranks, and I'm co-chairing the search committee with @SunnyShinLab/@BettsLab.
Please RT and contact us if you have questions about the position and our department.
https://t.co/DR7un2bjue
https://t.co/CZ1d2RlNk8

[Science Careers @ScienceCareers]

Recruiting Tenure Track Open Rank Professor-Biomedical Sciences - Tallahassee, Florida - Florida State University - https://t.co/xsPKocka9W #sciencejobs

[Terence Crofts @TerenceCrofts]

🥳Super excited for our lab manager's @EzzyFranck first first-author manuscript. We review the #antibiotic streptothricin 💊 and the known #AntibioticResistance mechanisms against it in bacteria 🦠
See below for a great twitter walkthrough from @npjAMR

[npj Antimicrobials and Resistance @npjAMR]

A new review article was published this week in @npjAMR on the history and potential of streptothricin #antibiotics from Ezabelle Franck & @TerenceCrofts 💊⤵️

(1/6)

https://t.co/npNtT6wG5B