Author

Alexis Villani

University of California, San FranciscoORCID 0000-0002-9309-1540Unclaimed ORCID profile · follow to get notified of new preprints

Biology Disciplines

Click to filter author papers

Microbiology· 2

Signature Assays, Organisms & Methods

Click to filter · or open tag

Organism:bacteria (other)· 2 Assay:DNA methylation· 2 Approach:experimental assay· 2 Research Focus:cell type annotation· 1 Research Focus:chromatin & epigenetic regulation· 1 Approach:genetic perturbation / CRISPR· 1 Research Focus:host-pathogen & immune response· 1 Approach:wet-lab / biochemical assay· 1

Frequent Co-Authors

Joseph Bondy‐DenomyiD· 2 shared Bálint CsörgőiD· 1 shared Chang YeiD· 1 shared Ehud BaniniD· 1 shared Ellay Avihu· 1 shared Esther ShmidoviD· 1 shared Hao YaniD· 1 shared Ilana Lebenthal-Loinger· 1 shared

Activity by Year

2025-2026 · peak 1/yr

Co-Author Collaboration Network

10 top collaborators · 27 mutual co-author links

Click any collaborator node to inspect or filter shared papers

Focal author (center)Selected co-authorORCID co-authorUnlinked name

Curved chords = mutual co-authorship

2 shared papersMicrobiology

Joseph Bondy‐DenomyORCID

Mutual co-authors in cluster

Author profile →

2 papers

Recent·Most cited

A phiKMV ligase-dependent DNA repair mechanism that mitigates DNA-targeting nucleases

Alexis Villani, Shweta Karambelkar, Nandini Pathak, Rhea Kamath, Sutharsan Govindarajan, Bálint Csörgő, Nikolai Varnavski, Joseph Bondy‐Denomy

The paper identifies a DNA repair mechanism in phages that allows them to resist CRISPR-Cas and R-M systems by repairing nuclease-induced breaks via a ligase-dependent process.

bioRxiv · Sep 23, 2026 · PreprintMicrobiology

Multigenerational Proteolytic Inactivation of Restriction Upon Subtle Genomic Hypomethylation

Esther Shmidov, Alexis Villani, Senén D. Mendoza, Ellay Avihu, Ilana Lebenthal-Loinger, Sarit Karako‐Lampert, Sivan Shoshani, Chang Ye, Yiding Wang, Hao Yan, Weixin Tang, Joseph Bondy‐Denomy, Ehud Banin

This study shows that Pseudomonas aeruginosa inactivates its type I R-M system via proteolysis at high temperatures, leading to prolonged genomic hypomethylation and a memory effect lasting over 60 generations.

Nature Microbiology · Sep 8, 2025Peer-reviewedMicrobiology