{"id":217366,"date":"2025-07-08T02:27:02","date_gmt":"2025-07-08T07:27:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/07\/scientists-uncover-superfamily-of-bacterial-predator-proteins"},"modified":"2025-07-08T02:27:02","modified_gmt":"2025-07-08T07:27:02","slug":"scientists-uncover-superfamily-of-bacterial-predator-proteins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/07\/scientists-uncover-superfamily-of-bacterial-predator-proteins","title":{"rendered":"Scientists uncover \u2018superfamily\u2019 of bacterial predator proteins"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/scientists-uncover-superfamily-of-bacterial-predator-proteins.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Scientists have identified a new type of protein in bacteria that could change our understanding of how these organisms interact with their environments.<\/p>\n<p>A new study, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-025-61633-0\" target=\"_blank\">published<\/a> in <i>Nature Communications<\/i>, focuses on a protein called PopA, found in the bacterial predator Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus. The protein forms a unique fivefold structure, unlike the usual single or three-part structures seen in similar proteins.<\/p>\n<p>An international research team, led by University of Birmingham scientists, used advanced imaging techniques to reveal that PopA has a bowl-like shape that can trap parts of the bacterial membrane inside it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Scientists have identified a new type of protein in bacteria that could change our understanding of how these organisms interact with their environments. A new study, published in Nature Communications, focuses on a protein called PopA, found in the bacterial predator Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus. The protein forms a unique fivefold structure, unlike the usual single or [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-217366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-futurism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217366"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217366\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}