Tamara O’Connor, Ph.D.

Tamara O’Connor, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor

410-955-7134

725 N. Wolfe St.
Physiology Bldg, Room 510
Baltimore, MD 21205


Background

Dr. Tamara O’Connor is an Assistant Professor of Biological Chemistry at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Director of Admission for the Graduate Program in Biological Chemistry. Dr. O’Connor’s research focuses on the molecular basis of infectious disease with a particular emphasis on the network of molecular interactions acting at the host-pathogen interface and pathogen evolution in natural reservoirs.

Dr. O’Connor received her Ph.D. in Biochemistry from McMaster University, Canada where she studied multicellular differentiation of the bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor with Dr. Justin Nodwell. She completed her postdoctoral training dissecting virulence mechanisms of the respiratory pathogen Legionella pneumophila with Dr. Ralph Isberg at Tufts University School of Medicine. She joined the Johns Hopkins faculty in 2013.

Dr. O’Connor is a member of the American Society for Microbiology and the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Dr. O’Connor received an Innovation Award from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Discovery Fund, a Discovery Award from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Fisher Center and was a Natalie V. Zucker Scholars Fellow and recipient of an Ontario Graduate Scholarship and a Bank of Montreal Graduate Scholarship in Science and Technology.

Centers and Institutes

Videos

Recent News Articles and Media Coverage

Research Interests

Microbial pathogenesis, pathogen evolution, antibiotics

Research Summary

The O’Connor lab studies bacterial pathogenesis focusing on defining the mechanisms by which bacterial pathogen establish infection, how they exploit host cell machinery to accomplish this, and how individual virulence proteins and their component pathways coordinately contribute to disease. In parallel, the O’Connor lab investigates how virulence strategies arise in environmental reservoirs as a consequence of bacterial interactions with protozoa and the role of these natural hosts in driving bacterial transmission and disease in humans. Using genetics, biochemistry, molecular and cellular biology, and functional genomics, the O’Connor lab examines the repertoires of virulence proteins required for growth in a broad assortment of hosts, how the network of molecular interactions differs between hosts, and the mechanisms by which bacterial pathogens cope with this variation.

O’Connor Lab – Lab website is currently under construction and will be available soon

Selected Publications

  • O’Connor TJ, Boyd D, Dorer M, Isberg RR (2012) Aggravating genetic interactions allow a solution to redundancy in a bacterial pathogen. Science 338:1440-1444
  • Boamah DK, Zhou G, Ensminger AW, O’Connor TJ (2017) From many hosts, one accidental pathogen: the diverse protozoan hosts of Legionella. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 7:477
  • Ghosh S and O’Connor TJ (2017) Beyond paralogs: the multiple layers of redundancy in bacterial pathogenesis. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 7:467
  • Park JM, Ghosh S, O’Connor TJ (2020) Combinatorial selection in environmental hosts drives the evolution of a human pathogen. Nat Microbiol. 5:599
  • Boamah D, Gilmore MC, Bourget S, Ghosh A, Hossain MJ, Vogel JP, Cava F, O’Connor TJ, (2023) Peptidoglycan deacetylation controls Type IV secretion and the intracellular survival of the bacterial pathogen Legionella pneumophila. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. 120:e2119658120.
  • Ghosh S, Bandyopadhyay S, Smith DM, Adak S, Semenkovich CF, Nagy L, Wolfgang MJ, O’Connor TJ. (2023) Legionella usurps host cell lipids for vacuole expansion and bacterial growth. PLoS Pathogens. 20:e1011996.
  • Shin CJ and O’Connor TJ. (2024) Novel induction of broad-spectrum antibiotics by the human pathogen Legionella. mSphere. e0012024.

Honors

  • Fisher Center Discovery Program Award, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, 2018
  • Discovery Fund Innovation Award, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, 2014
  • Natalie V. Zucker Research Scholars Postdoctoral Fellow, 2009
  • Graduate Research Fellow, Ontario Graduate Scholarship Fund, 2003
  • Graduate Research Fellow, Bank of Montreal Graduate Scholarship in Science and Technology, 2002
  • Graduate Program Affiliations
  • Biological Chemistry (BC) Graduate Program
  • Biochemistry, Cellular and Molecular Biology (BCMB) Graduate Program
  • Immunology (IMM) Graduate Program
  • Cellular and Molecular Medicine (CMM) Graduate Program
  • Cross Disciplinary Graduate Program in Biomedical Sciences (XDBio)

Memberships

  • American Society for Microbiology
  • American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

Professional Activities

  • Department of Biological Chemistry Retreat Committee, Co-Chair, 2017-present
  • Department of Biological Chemistry Seminar Series, Chair, 2015-present
  • Biological Chemistry Graduate Program Admissions Committee, Member, 2013-present
  • Cross Disciplinary Gradate Program in Biomedical Sciences Admissions Committee, Member, 2018-present
  • Immunology Gradate Program Admissions Committee, Member, 2019-2020
  • Graduate Program in Biological Chemistry, Director, 2018 -present
  • Johns Hopkins Bug Super Group, Co-Founder, 2017-present
  • Society for Advancement of Chicanos/Hispanics and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS), Baltimore Chapter, Faculty Advisor, 2017-present
  • Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology, Associate Editor, 2022-present

Additional Training

  • Postdoctoral Fellowship, Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, MA