Ruth Isenberg, PhD

Postdoctoral Fellow

Ruth Isenberg

I grew up in the Pacific Northwest near Tacoma, Washington and graduated from the University of Puget Sound with a BS in Molecular and Cellular Biology in 2016. I earned my PhD in Microbiology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2023 in Dr. Mark Mandel’s lab where I studied cyclic diguanylate regulation of beneficial host colonization using the Vibrio fischeri-Hawaiian bobtail squid symbiosis as a model system. Now as a postdoc in Dr. Julia Willett's lab, my research focuses on investigating the mechanisms that underlie Enterococcus faecalis inhibition by Streptococcus mutans. My goal is to become a professor at a primarily undergraduate institution where I can continue teaching and mentoring undergrads in the classroom and the lab!

 

Selected Publications

  1. Isenberg RY, Sackih CW, Willett JLE (2025). Streptococcal natural products mediate interspecies competition with Gram-positive pathogens. bioRxiv. DOI: 10.1101/2025.07.31.667707
  2. Zarate D, Isenberg RY, Pavelsky M, Speare L, Jackson A, Mandel MJ, Septer AN (2025). The conserved global regulator H-NS has a strain-specific impact on biofilm formation in Vibrio fischeri symbionts. bioRxiv. DOI: 10.1101/2024.12.19.629378
  3. Isenberg RY, Mandel MJ (2024). Cyclic Diguanylate in the Wild: Roles During Plant and Animal Colonization. Annu. Rev. Micro. DOI: 10.1146/annurev-micro-041522-101729
  4. Isenberg RY, Holschbach CS, Gao J, Mandel MJ (2024). Functional analysis of cyclic diguanylate-modulating proteins in Vibrio fischeri. mSystems. DOI: 10.1128/msystems.00956-24
  5. McCaughey CS, Trebino MA, McAtamney A, Isenberg RY, Mandel MJ, Yildiz FH, Sanchez LM (2024). A label-free approach for relative spatial quantitation of c-di-GMP in microbial biofilms. Anal. Chem. DOI: 10.1021/acs.analchem.3c04687
  6. Vander Griend JA, Isenberg RY, Kotla KR, Mandel MJ (2024). Transcriptional pathways across colony biofilm models in the symbiont Vibrio fischeri. mSystems. DOI: 10.1128/msystems.00815-23
  7. Isenberg RY, Christensen DG, Visick KL, Mandel MJ (2022). High levels of cyclic di-guanylate interfere with initiation of a beneficial symbiosis. mBio 13:e0167122. DOI: 10.1128/mbio.01671-22
Ruth