CHAIR OF BACPATH 2026

Dr. Mitali Sarkar-Tyson is the Chair of the BacPath 2026 and Local Organising Committee of the ASM WA Branch. She earned her PhD in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the University of Manchester (UK) and subsequently worked as a postdoctoral research scientist at the Wellcome Trust Biocentre, University of Dundee. Mitali then served as a Principal Scientist at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (UK) before moving to the University of Western Australia as a Senior Research Fellow, where she established her own research group investigating bacterial pathogenesis using both in vitro and in vivo infection models.

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR

Dr Tim Barnett gained his BSc (Hons) from the University of Western Australia and PhD from the University of Tasmania. Following postdoctoral positions at Emory University and the University of Queensland he joined The Kids Research Institute Australia in 2017. Tim's research focuses on the pathogenesis of Group A Streptococcus infections, including antibiotic resistance mechanisms, host-pathogen interactions, and Acute Rheumatic Fever. His team’s recent work has revealed novel antibiotic resistance mechanisms that cannot be detected in standard clinical testing. Currently, Tim is a group leader at The Kids Research Institute Australia, Senior Lecturer at the University of Western Australia and Deputy Director of the Wesfarmers Centre of Vaccines and Infectious Diseases. In 2023 and 2024, he received awards for research mentorship and PhD supervision excellence.

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR | CURTIN UNIVERSITY

Dr Ramsay has wide-ranging interests in bacterial gene regulation and evolution. An overarching theme to his research is the evolution of bacteria through horizontal gene transfer and the biology of the mobile genetic elements that facilitate horizontal gene transfer.

Dr Ramsay carried out his PhD in 2004-2008 at the University of Otago with Prof. Clive Ronson. He was then a University of Cambridge Herchel Smith Postdoctoral Fellow from 2008-2011 and a Health Sciences Career Development Fellow at the University of Otago until 2013. Dr Ramsay's investigations explore the impacts of mobile genetic elements in both health related and agricultural contexts. In 2018 Dr Ramsay was awarded an ARC Future Fellowship and he is currently an Associate Professor at Curtin University in the Curtin Medical School and Curtin Health Innovation Research Institute.

LECTURER | UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA

Dr Nicole Bzdyl is a molecular microbiologist who completed her MInfDis and PhD at the Marshall Centre for Infectious Diseases Research and Training, University of Western Australia. She is currently the secretary of the ASM WA branch committee. Nicole has held postdoctoral positions focusing on therapeutic screening in Gram-negative bacteria as well as understanding the underlying mechanisms of treatment failure in intracellular environments by Group A Streptococcus.

RESEARCH OFFICER | PERTH CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL

August is a Postdoctoral researcher working as part of the Group A Strep Pathogenesis and Diagnostics team at The Kids Research Institute in Perth. Her research focusses on the ecology and evolution of paediatric respiratory bacterial pathogens including Group A Streptococcus and the meningococcus. In 2025,  August commenced a BrightSpark Early Career Child Health Research Fellowship to study the interactions of the tonsillar microbiome with Group A Strep.