Marco Galardini is a computational biologist with a taste for microbiology. He did his bachelor and master studies in Italy at the university of Florence and Bologna, and his PhD in the lab of Marco Bazzicalupo. He then did two postdocs: one in the lab of Pedro Beltrao at EMBL-EBI, and one in the lab of Mo Khalil at Boston University. He leads the Microbial Pangenomes Lab at TWINCORE since October 2020.
His current focus is on developing computational methods to study the genetic determinants of bacterial virulence and antimicrobial resistance and the empirical study of the evolution of resistance. His professorship in Hannover is funded by the RESIST Cluster of Excellence.
By applying statistical genetics methods to pathogen genome sequences, we aim to identify and validate genetic determinants of phenotypes such as pathogenicity, virulence and antibiotic resistance, e.g. in E. coli and P. aeruginosa.
Population genetic studies show that genetic variability between bacterial strains can influence the evolution of antimicrobial resistance. Using automated laboratory evolution (ALE), we are investigating how genetic backgrounds control AMR evolution.
Thanks to high-throughput sequencing, genome sequences of hundreds of bacterial strains can be analyzed efficiently, revealing differences of up to 60 % in gene content, as in E. coli. With the help of machine learning, we want to better predict the functions of accessory genes and decipher their contribution to survival in specialized niches.
Mulkern A, Vu T, Popella L, Kerrinnes T, Ðurica-Mitić S, Halte M, Dresbach-Hill K, Uhlemann A, Uphoff S, Barquist L, Vogel J, Galardini M
Cacace E, Tietgen M, Steinhauer M, Mateus A, Schultze T, Eckermann M, Galardini M, Varik V, Koumoutsi A, Parzeller J, Corona F, Orakov A, Knopp M, Brauer-Nikonow A, Bork P, Romao C, Zimmermann M, Cloetens P, Savitski M, Typas A, Göttig S
Burgaya J, Damaris B, Fiebig J, Galardini M
Innocenti G, Obara M, Costa B, Jacobsen H, Katzmarzyk M, Cicin-Sain L, Kalinke U, Galardini M
D'Amato R, Taxiarchi C, Galardini M, Trusso A, Minuz R, Grilli S, Somerville A, Shittu D, Khalil A, Galizi R, Crisanti A, Simoni A, Müller R
How bacteria develop resistance to antisense antibiotics - and how future therapies can be designed to reduce the risk of resistance
TWINCORE establishes task force
Inaugural lecture on 6 March 2026