Barbara Bosch

2026 Regional Award Winner — Post-Doc

Barbara Bosch

Current Position:
Senior Resident in Clinical Pathology

Institution:
KU Leuven

Discipline:
Microbiology

Recognized for: Advancing mechanism-guided drug discovery for priority pathogens, including Mycobacterium tuberculosis, by developing high-throughput methods to identify and screen novel bacterial inhibitors.


Areas of Research Interest and Expertise:
Antimicrobial Resistance, Antibiotic Development, Functional Genomics, Cryo-electron Microscopy, Tuberculosis

Previous Positions:

BSc, KU Leuven, Belgium
MD, KU Leuven, Belgium
Resident in Pediatrics, Leuven University Hospitals, Belgium
PhD, KU Leuven, Belgium (Advisor: Christiane De Boeck)
PhD, The Rockefeller University (Advisor: Jeremy Rock)

Research Summary:

Antibiotic resistance is a major healthcare challenge that reduces the effectiveness of existing treatments and increasingly places a burden on diagnostic and therapeutic resources. Physician-scientist Barbara Bosch, MD, PhD, employs both fundamental microbiology and translational approaches to confront this challenge. Bosch combines high-throughput screening methods to identify novel antimicrobial targets with a mechanistic understanding of bacterial physiology to uncover vulnerabilities within pathogenic bacteria. By exploiting these weak points, Bosch’s work guides the rational design of innovative antibiotic combinations that enhance bacterial killing. Though rooted in fundamental discovery, Bosch's research is ultimately driven by the goal of improving patient care, exemplified by a patented combination therapy for tuberculosis.

“In our efforts to advance clinical medicine, we are often confronted with incomplete puzzles. Basic science can provide the missing pieces and insight into how the puzzle fits together. Receiving the Blavatnik Award is a tremendous recognition of my work as a physician-scientist and encourages me to continue pursuing this path.”

Key Publications:

  1. B. Bosch*, V. Munsamy-Govender*, J. Sarathy, M. Lilic , P.D.B. Olinares, K.A. Eckartt, P. Nalam, M. Lang, M. Simon, A. Richter, J.M. Rock, E.A. Campbell. Transcription co-inhibition alters drug resistance evolution and enhances Mycobacterium tuberculosis clearance from granulomas. Nature Microbiology, 2026.
  2. J.J. Brewer, K. Inlow, R.A.Mooney, B. Bosch, P.D.B. Olinares, L.P. Marcelino, B.T. Chait, R. Landick, J. Gelles, E. A. Campbell, S.A. Darst. RapA opens the RNA polymerase clamp to disrupt post-termination complexes and prevent cytotoxic R-loop formation. Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, 2025.
  3. K.A. Eckartt*, M. Delbeau*, V. Munsamy-Govender, M.A. DeJesus, Z.A. Azadian, A.K. Reddy, J. Chandanani, N.C. Poulton, S. Quiñones-Garcia, B. Bosch, R. Landick, E.A. Campbell, J.M Rock. Compensatory evolution in NusG improves fitness of drug-resistant M. tuberculosis. Nature, 2024.
  4. B. Bosch*, M.A. DeJesus*, N.C. Poulton, W. Zhang, C.A. Engelhart, A. Zaveri, S. Lavalette, N. Ruecker, C. Trujillo, J.B. Wallach, S. Li, S. Ehrt, B.T. Chait, D. Schnappinger, J.M. Rock. Genome-wide gene expression tuning reveals diverse vulnerabilities of M. tuberculosis. Cell, 2021 

Other Honors:

2025 Vincent Meyer Clinical Scholar, The Rockefeller University
2025 Pilot award, Black Family Therapeutic Development Fund
2025 Advanced grant, Women Entrepreneurship Fund
2024 Christoffel Plantin Certificate of Recognition, Belgian government
2024 Pilot project grant, Clinical and Translational Science Awards (NCATS)
2024 Pilot award, Women Entrepreneurship Fund
2023 Sternberg prize, University of Wisconsin-Madison
2022 Birnstiel Award - Honorable mention, Max Birnstiel Foundation and the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology
2020 PhD Fellowship, Boehringer Ingelheim Fonds

In the Media:

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