Soumaya Zlitni, PhD, BS

ASST PROF IN RES-HCOMP
Medicine
[email protected]

Trillions of microbes live on and inside our bodies, forming what can be described as an 'organ' that plays a critical role in health, physiology, and defense against pathogens. One of the major questions in this field is how microbes come together to form communities that perform essential functions for the host.
The Zlitni lab integrates tools from microbiology, biochemistry, and advanced -omics technologies to investigate how microbial communication shapes both the assembly and function of the human microbiome. Beyond gaining fundamental insights into microbial communication, we aim to apply this knowledge toward developing live biotherapeutic interventions that restore microbiota resilience when it has been compromised.

Publications: 

Dual quorum-sensing control of purine biosynthesis drives pathogenic fitness of Enterococcus faecalis.

bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology

Zlitni S, Bowden S, Sberro H, Torres MDT, Vaughan JM, Pinto AFM, Pinto Y, Fernandez D, Röst H, Saghatelian A, de la Fuente-Nunez C, Bhatt AS

Metabolic diversity in commensal protists regulates intestinal immunity and trans-kingdom competition.

Cell

Gerrick ER, Zlitni S, West PT, Carter MM, Mechler CM, Olm MR, Caffrey EB, Li JA, Higginbottom SK, Severyn CJ, Kracke F, Spormann AM, Sonnenburg JL, Bhatt AS, Howitt MR

The Tomato Brown Rugose Fruit Virus Movement Protein Gene Is a Novel Microbial Source Tracking Marker.

Applied and environmental microbiology

Natarajan A, Fremin BJ, Schmidtke DT, Wolfe MK, Zlitni S, Graham KE, Brooks EF, Severyn CJ, Sakamoto KM, Lacayo NJ, Kuersten S, Koble J, Caves G, Kaplan I, Singh U, Jagannathan P, Rezvani AR, Bhatt AS, Boehm AB

Tomato brown rugose fruit virus Mo gene is a novel microbial source tracking marker.

bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology

Natarajan A, Fremin BJ, Schmidtke DT, Wolfe MK, Zlitni S, Graham KE, Brooks EF, Severyn CJ, Sakamoto KM, Lacayo NJ, Kuersten S, Koble J, Caves G, Kaplan I, Singh U, Jagannathan P, Rezvani AR, Bhatt AS, Boehm AB

Human gut microbiota after bariatric surgery alters intestinal morphology and glucose absorption in mice independently of obesity.

Gut

Anhê FF, Zlitni S, Zhang SY, Choi BS, Chen CY, Foley KP, Barra NG, Surette MG, Biertho L, Richard D, Tchernof A, Lam TKT, Marette A, Schertzer J

Gastrointestinal symptoms and fecal shedding of SARS-CoV-2 RNA suggest prolonged gastrointestinal infection.

Med (New York, N.Y.)

Natarajan A, Zlitni S, Brooks EF, Vance SE, Dahlen A, Hedlin H, Park RM, Han A, Schmidtke DT, Verma R, Jacobson KB, Parsonnet J, Bonilla HF, Singh U, Pinsky BA, Andrews JR, Jagannathan P, Bhatt AS

Life-long exercise training and inherited aerobic endurance capacity produce converging gut microbiome signatures in rodents.

Physiological reports

Anhê FF, Zlitni S, Barra NG, Foley KP, Nilsson MI, Nederveen JP, Koch LG, Britton SL, Tarnopolsky MA, Schertzer JD

Publisher Correction: Standardized preservation, extraction and quantification techniques for detection of fecal SARS-CoV-2 RNA.

Nature communications

Natarajan A, Han A, Zlitni S, Brooks EF, Vance SE, Wolfe M, Singh U, Jagannathan P, Pinsky BA, Boehm A, Bhatt AS

Standardized preservation, extraction and quantification techniques for detection of fecal SARS-CoV-2 RNA.

Nature communications

Natarajan A, Han A, Zlitni S, Brooks EF, Vance SE, Wolfe M, Singh U, Jagannathan P, Pinsky BA, Boehm A, Bhatt AS

Standardized and optimized preservation, extraction and quantification techniques for detection of fecal SARS-CoV-2 RNA.

medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences

Natarajan A, Han A, Zlitni S, Brooks EF, Vance SE, Wolfe M, Singh U, Jagannathan P, Pinsky BA, Boehm A, Bhatt AS

Gut microbiota impairs insulin clearance in obese mice.

Molecular metabolism

Foley KP, Zlitni S, Duggan BM, Barra NG, Anhê FF, Cavallari JF, Henriksbo BD, Chen CY, Huang M, Lau TC, Plante R, Schwab M, Marette A, Schertzer JD

Adipose Tissue Inflammation Is Directly Linked to Obesity-Induced Insulin Resistance, while Gut Dysbiosis and Mitochondrial Dysfunction Are Not Required.

Function (Oxford, England)

Petrick HL, Foley KP, Zlitni S, Brunetta HS, Paglialunga S, Miotto PM, Politis-Barber V, O'Dwyer C, Philbrick DJ, Fullerton MD, Schertzer JD, Holloway GP

NOD2 in hepatocytes engages a liver-gut axis to protect against steatosis, fibrosis, and gut dysbiosis during fatty liver disease in mice.

American journal of physiology. Endocrinology and metabolism

Cavallari JF, Pokrajac NT, Zlitni S, Foley KP, Henriksbo BD, Schertzer JD

Strain-resolved microbiome sequencing reveals mobile elements that drive bacterial competition on a clinical timescale.

Genome medicine

Zlitni S, Bishara A, Moss EL, Tkachenko E, Kang JB, Culver RN, Andermann TM, Weng Z, Wood C, Handy C, Ji HP, Batzoglou S, Bhatt AS

Mimicking the human environment in mice reveals that inhibiting biotin biosynthesis is effective against antibiotic-resistant pathogens.

Nature microbiology

Carfrae LA, MacNair CR, Brown CM, Tsai CN, Weber BS, Zlitni S, Rao VN, Chun J, Junop MS, Coombes BK, Brown ED

Large-Scale Analyses of Human Microbiomes Reveal Thousands of Small, Novel Genes.

Cell

Sberro H, Fremin BJ, Zlitni S, Edfors F, Greenfield N, Snyder MP, Pavlopoulos GA, Kyrpides NC, Bhatt AS

Long term but not short term exposure to obesity related microbiota promotes host insulin resistance.

Nature communications

Foley KP, Zlitni S, Denou E, Duggan BM, Chan RW, Stearns JC, Schertzer JD

Degradation of MAC13243 and studies of the interaction of resulting thiourea compounds with the lipoprotein targeting chaperone LolA.

Bioorganic & medicinal chemistry letters

Barker CA, Allison SE, Zlitni S, Nguyen ND, Das R, Melacini G, Capretta AA, Brown ED

Chemical genomics in Escherichia coli identifies an inhibitor of bacterial lipoprotein targeting.

Nature chemical biology

Pathania R, Zlitni S, Barker C, Das R, Gerritsma DA, Lebert J, Awuah E, Melacini G, Capretta FA, Brown ED

High-throughput screening of model bacteria.

Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.)

Zlitni S, Blanchard JE, Brown ED

Mutations in C2orf37, encoding a nucleolar protein, cause hypogonadism, alopecia, diabetes mellitus, mental retardation, and extrapyramidal syndrome.

American journal of human genetics

Alazami AM, Al-Saif A, Al-Semari A, Bohlega S, Zlitni S, Alzahrani F, Bavi P, Kaya N, Colak D, Khalak H, Baltus A, Peterlin B, Danda S, Bhatia KP, Schneider SA, Sakati N, Walsh CA, Al-Mohanna F, Meyer B, Alkuraya FS

Custom People Group: 
UCSF Microbiome Researchers