Prof. Dr. Ines Mandić-Mulec received her PhD in microbiology in 1993 at New York University, NY (USA) and completed her postdoctoral training in the USA (at the Public Health Research Institute and Skirball Institute,New York, USA). She returned to the University of Ljubljana in 1999 and was elected a full professor in 2010. 

Ines Mandic Mulec is professor of Microbiology and Vice-dean of the Department of Microbiology at the Biotechnical Faculty (BF), University of Ljubljana. She holds the Chair of Microbial ecology and physiology, which unites faculty members, postdocs, Ph.D. students, laboratory technicians that carry out various research projects addressing the dynamics, mechanisms, and evolution of intra and interspecies microbial interactions and contribute time to teaching variety of microbiology courses and supervision of student’s thesis projects.

The main research interest of Mandic-Mulec lab is deciphering molecular mechanisms and consequences and evolution of bacterial group behaviours such as cell-cell signalling (quorum sensing), kin discrimination, and horizontal gene transfer in genetically heterogeneous groups such as biofilms or swarms. Recent work also addresses Bacillus – pathogen (Salmonella, Campylobacter) interactions. Combining her interest in microbial ecology and molecular genetics of Bacillus subtilis, she aims to understand and develop ecologically friendly plant growth-promoting bacteria and/or novel probiotics. She has published over 90 research works and has been invited to speak at prestigious universities and international conferences.

Assist. Prof. Dr. Iztok Dogša received his PhD in biotechnology in 2008 from the Biotechnical Faculty, UL.

He teaches microbiology and biotechnology laboratory courses and is an expert in a variety of microbiological techniques, in structural modelling of the small angle X-ray scattering, rheology, confocal fluorescence microscopy, HPLC, EPR and data mining and mathematical analysis.

He was awarded the EMBO fellowship to work at the Institute of Biophysics and Nanosystems Research of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Graz, Austria.

His research interest lies in understanding structural and functional properties of polymers, especially polysaccharides, their synthesis and biotechnological applications, he aims to understand underlying forces governing mechanical properties of biofilms and molecular bases, dynamics and function of bacterial signalling (e.g. quorum sensing) and his work was published in high impact journals (PNAS, Nature communications).

Technician Simona Leskovec has been an active and important member of Chair of Microbiology since 1987.

Simona is responsible for taking care of our collection of microorganisms, for managing the laboratories at the Chair of microbiology, she is ordering all needed chemicals and consumables and importantly contributes to preparation of needed materials for student’s laboratory courses as well as to supervision of students.

She enjoys isolating novel bacteria, testing their antagonistic interactions with pathogenic fungi and is an expert on analyses of nitrogen and phosphorus ions in environmental samples.

Dr. Eva Kovačevec received her PhD in Biosciences (Biology) in 2016 at the Biotechnical Faculty-UL.

During her PhD she focused on endophytic fungi from common buckwheat seeds and their interactions with plants and copper compounds. She has been awarded fellowships to gain experience abroad .

After her PhD she joined the Chair of Microbiology and extended her research interest to bacterial social interactions, first focusing on Bacillus subtilis-Streptomyces interactions and more recently by being awarded a postdoctoral grant, in investigating competitive mechanisms in mixed biofilms of Salmonella-Bacillus. She is gaining expertise in rheology, confocal microscopy and molecular biology of Bacillus subtilis.

She is studying Bacillus subtilis biofilms and the effects of the environmental parameters on their rheological properties.

She also aims to develop a microfluidic system for investigation of genetically heterogeneous biofilms of Bacillus subtilis.

Her supervisors are prof. Dr. David Stopar and assistant professor Polonca Štefanič.

Her co-supervisors are assistant professor Iztok Dogša and prof. Ines Mandič-Mulec

She is interested in social interactions of bacteria, and decided to investigate during her PhD Bacillus-Salmonella interactions in biofilms.

Specifically she aims to understand how spatial distribution of both species and nutrient concentrations influence interspecies interactions. She would also like to understand mechanisms behind these interactions and  identify genetic loci that contribute to observed phenotypes and apply microfluidics to study pathogen-probiotic interactions at the single cell level. Her thesis supervisor is prof. Ines mandič-Mulec. Her co-supervisor is assistant professor Tjaša Danevčič.

She would like to understand how kin discrimination influences the horizonTAL gene transfer at the meeting point of kin and non-kin swarms; she also evolves B. subtilis swarms to understand how social interactions between kin and non-kin swarming groups shape the evolution of swarming phenotype and kinship.

In addition she teaches laboratory courses in biotechnology to chemistry students. Her PhD supervisor is prof. Ines Mandic Mulec.

Her co-supervisor is assistant professor, Polonca Štefanič.

His PhD focuses on interactions between a probiotic Bacillus subtilis and the enteropathogen Campylobacter jejuni in biofilms.

He aims to decipher the molecular mechanisms behind the interactions in biofilms. He is also involved in studies on Salmonella - Bacillus interactions in collaboration with prof. Hans Steenackers (CELSA project).

He has gained expertise in bacterial co-cultivation, co-adhesion, confocal laser microscopy and genetic engineering of bacterial strains. His PhD supervisors are prof. Sonja Smole Možina and prof. Ines Mandić-Mulec.

Dr. Maja Bolješić has been investigating the influence of kin discrimination of fitness, cell segregation and altruistic help in genetically mixed biofilms of Bacillus subtilis and is preparing her thesis.

Supervisor prof. I. Mandic Mulec.

She is presently working at the National Institute of Health in Slovenia.

Dr. Mihael Špacapan, defended his PhD in 2019.

He investigated the role of the CoX signaling peptide dependent quorum sensing system in Bacillus subtilis, focussing on the role of signalling in pellicle development, sporulation and protease production in the robust biofilm former, B. subtilis PS-216. He confirmed the importance of ComX in promoting the synthesis of extracellular proteases and showed that these proteases degrade ComX, which may have consequences for the dynamics of QS response. Besides he showed that ComX promotes sporulation and that mutants lacking ComX have a delayed but highly synchronized entry into sporulation, suggesting that ComX contributes to the phenotypic heterogeneity in biofilms.

His supervisors were assistant professor Tjaša Danevčič and prof. Ines Mandič Mulec. He is presently gaining research experience in the very successful Biotech company Acies Bio and will continue his career as a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of dr. Vitorio Venturi ( ICGEB).

Dr. Ana Dragoš has defended her PhD in 2014 (supervisor prof. Ines Mandić-Mulec).

Has worked on the ComQXPA quorum sensing system and investigated the interactions between wild type ComX producers and the ComX deficient mutant.

She also investigated the diversity of the ComQXPA system in Bacillus subtilis isolates o from the tomato rhizosphere and studied  the PGPR properties of these isolates.

Her thesis supervisor was prof. Ines Mandić-Mulec. She has continued her studies as the  postdoctoral Humbolt scholar under the supervision of prof.

Akos Kovacs, first in Jena and at Technical University of Denmark. She is presently working on the evolution of Bacillus subtilis bacteriophages. 

Dr. Luka Aušec has defended his PhD in 2014 (supervisor prof. Ines Mandić-Mulec).

He has investigated the diversity and function of  bacterial laccases and has collaborated extensively with a variety of laboratories across the EU as the active member of the FP7- EU project Metaexplore. 

He is now a chief discovery officer at Genialis, a data science and drug discovery company in Slovenia.