Associate Professor Rietie Venter

Associate Professor UniSA Clinical & Health Sciences

City East Campus (P4-03)
tel +61 8 830 21515

email Rietie.Venter@unisa.edu.au

Available for media comment
Research Degree Supervisor

About me

Antimicrobial resistance
Drug efflux proteins
Novel antibiotics
Mechanisms of resistance
Multidrug resistance

I obtained my BSc Hons and Master’s degrees with distinction from the University of the Free State in South Africa. As top student in my BSc Hons class I secured an international scholarship to fund my PhD studies at the University of Leeds. After completing my PhD on membrane protein biochemistry at the University of Leeds in the beautiful Yorkshire Dales, I moved to Cambridge, where I spend twelve years doing research on multidrug transporters, first as a post-doc and later running my own research group as a Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Fellow in the Department of Pharmacology at the University of Cambridge. During this time, I was also appointed as College Lecturer in Robinson College, University of Cambridge, where I did small-group...

UniSA Clinical & Health Sciences

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Research

Research themes

Scarce resources
Healthy futures

Research focus

Biochemistry and Cell Biology
Microbiology
Biological Sciences
Medical and Health Sciences
Pharmacology and Pharmaceutical Sciences

Highlights

My research focuses on antimicrobial resistance. ‘Superbugs’ are costing the medical and veterinary industry billions of dollars a year and antimicrobial resistance is one of the world’s most pressing health problems. According to the WHO we are fast approaching a post-antibiotic era where small injuries and minor infections will once again be fatal. Work in my laboratory is aimed at finding novel ways of treating infectious disease by characterising bacterial membrane proteins that are involved in drug resistance and/or virulence and on developing drugs that act on these targets. We are currently working on drug efflux pumps, iron transporters and cell division proteins in pathogenic bacteria. Most of our work... Read more

Research

Outputs

Research since 2008 is shown below. To see earlier years visit ORCID, ResearcherID or Scopus

Open access indicates that an output is open access.

Highlights

Year	Output
2015	Venter, R, Mowla, R, Ohene-Agyei, T & Ma, S 2015, 'RND-type drug efflux pumps from Gram-negative bacteria: molecular mechanism and inhibition', Frontiers in Microbiology, vol. 6, article no. 377, pp. 1-11. Open access 93 82 1
2014	Ohene-Agyei, T, Mowla, R, Rahman, T & Venter, R 2014, 'Phytochemicals increase the antibacterial activity of antibiotics by acting on a drug efflux pump0', MicrobiologyOpen, vol. 3, no. 6, pp. 885-896. Open access 37 36 4

Chapters

Year	Output
2020	Polyak, SW, Mowla, R & Venter, H 2020, 'Measuring small molecule binding to Escherichia coli AcrB by surface plasmon resonance', in Nikolaos E Labrou (ed.), Targeting Enzymes for Pharmaceutical Development, Humana, US, ch. 7, pp. 119-130. 1
2013	Du, D, Venter, H, Pos, KM & Luisi, BF 2013, 'The machinery and mechanism of multidrug efflux in Gram-negative bacteria', in EW Yu, Q Zhang & MH Brown (eds), Microbial efflux pumps: current research, Caister Academic Press, UK, ch. 3, pp. 35-49.
2008	Roach, PC, O'Reilly, J, Norbertczak, H, Hope, R, Venter, H, Patching, S, Jamshad, M, Stockley, PG, Baldwin, SA, Herbert, RB, Rutherford, NG, Bill, RM & Henderson, PJ 2008, 'Equipping a Research Scale Fermentation Laboratory for Production of Membrane Proteins', in B McNeil & LM Harvey, Practical Fermentation Technology, John Wiley & Sons, US, ch. 3, pp. 37 - 68.

Journal Articles

Year	Output
2020	Ogunniyi, AD, Dandie, CE, Brunetti, G, Drigo, B, Aleer, S, Hall, B, Ferro, S, Deo, P, Venter, H, Myers, B, Donner, E & Lombi, E 2020, 'Neutral electrolyzed oxidizing water is effective for pre-harvest decontamination of fresh produce', Food Microbiology, vol. in press, pp. 1-41.
2020	Ogunniyi, AD, Tenzin, S, Ferro, S, Venter, H, Pi, H, Amorico, T, Deo, P & Trott, DJ 2020, 'A pH-neutral electrolyzed oxidizing water significantly reduces microbial contamination of fresh spinach leaves', Food Microbiology, vol. 93, article no. 103614, pp. 1-9.
2019	Dandie, CE, Ogunniyi, AD, Ferro, S, Hall, B, Drigo, B, Chow, CW, Venter, H, Myers, B, Deo, P, Donner, E & Lombi, E 2019, 'Disinfection options for irrigation water: reducing the risk of fresh produce contamination with human pathogens', Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology, online, pp. 1-32. 1 1
2019	Imani Rad, H, Peeri, H, Amani, M, Mohammadnia, A, Ogunniyi, AD, Khazandi, M, Venter, H & Arzanlou, M 2019, 'Allicin prevents the formation of Proteus-induced urinary crystals and the blockage of catheter in a bladder model in vitro', Microbial Pathogenesis, vol. 132, pp. 293-301.
2019	Jin, C, Alenazy, R, Wang, Y, Mowla, R, Qin, Y, Tan, JQE, Modi, ND, Gu, X, Polyak, SW, Venter, H & Ma, S 2019, 'Design, synthesis and evaluation of a series of 5-methoxy-2,3-naphthalimide derivatives as AcrB inhibitors for the reversal of bacterial resistance', Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry Letters, vol. 29, no. 7, pp. 882-889. 1 1
2019	Khazandi, M, Pi, H, Chan, WY, Ogunniyi, AD, Sim, JXF, Venter, H, Garg, S, Page, SW, Hill, PB, McCluskey, A & Trott, DJ 2019, 'In vitro antimicrobial activity of robenidine, ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid and polymyxin B nonapeptide against important human and veterinary pathogens', Frontiers in Microbiology, vol. 10, article no. 837, pp. 1-15. Open access 3 2 1
2019	Ogunniyi, AD, Dandie, CE, Ferro, S, Hall, B, Drigo, B, Brunetti, G, Venter, H, Myers, B, Deo, P, Donner, E & Lombi, E 2019, 'Comparative antibacterial activities of neutral electrolyzed oxidizing water and other chlorine-based sanitizers', Scientific Reports, vol. 9, article no. 19955, pp. 1-13. Open access 2 1
2019	Sim, J, Khazandi, M, Pi, H, Venter, H, Trott, D & Deo, P 2019, 'Antimicrobial effects of cinnamon essential oil and cinnamaldehyde combined with EDTA against canine otitis externa pathogens', Journal of Applied Microbiology, vol. 127, no. 1, pp. 99-108. Open access 4 2 1
2019	Venter, H 2019, 'Reversing resistance to counter antimicrobial resistance in the World Health Organisation's critical priority of most dangerous pathogens', Bioscience Reports: Molecular and Cellular Biology of the Cell Surface, vol. 29, no. 4, article no. BSR20180474, pp. 1-12. Open access 3 2
2019	Wang, Y, Alenzy, R, Song, D, Liu, X, Teng, Y, Mowla, R, Ma, Y, Polyak, SW, Venter, H & Ma, S 2019, 'Structural optimization of natural product nordihydroguaretic acid to discover novel analogues as AcrB inhibitors', European Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, in press, pp. 1-18. 1 1
2018	Bi, F, Ji, S, Venter, H, Liu, J, Semple, SJ & Ma, S 2018, 'Substitution of terminal amide with 1H-1,2,3-triazole: Identification of unexpected class of potent antibacterial agents', Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry Letters, vol. 28, no. 5, pp. 884-891. 8 8 1
2018	Bi, F, Song, D, Zhang, N, Liu, Z, Gu, X, Hu, C, Cai, X, Venter, H & Ma, S 2018, 'Design, synthesis and structure-based optimization of novel isoxazole-containing benzamide derivatives as FtsZ modulators', European Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, vol. 159, pp. 90-103. 10 9 1
2018	Khazandi, M, Al-Farha, AAB, Coombs, GW, O'Dea, M, Pang, S, Trott, DJ, Aviles, RR, Hemmatzadeh, F, Venter, H, Ogunniyi, AD, Hoare, A, Abraham, S & Petrovski, KR 2018, 'Genomic characterization of coagulase-negative staphylococci including methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus sciuri causing bovine mastitis', Veterinary Microbiology, vol. 219, pp. 17-22. Open access 8 3 1
2018	Liu, J, Ma, R, Bi, F, Zhang, F, Hu, C, Venter, H, Semple, SJ & Ma, S 2018, 'Novel 5-methyl-2-phenylphenanthridium derivatives as FtsZ-targeting antibacterial agents from structural simplification of natural product sanguinarine', Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry Letters, vol. 28, no. 10, pp. 1825-1831. 9 8
2018	Mowla, R, Wang, Y, Ma, S & Venter, H 2018, 'Kinetic analysis of the inhibition of the drug efflux protein AcrB using surface plasmon resonance', BBA: Biomembranes, vol. 1860, no. 4, pp.878-886. Open access 9 5 1
2018	Ogunniyi, AD, Kopecki, Z, Hickey, EE, Khazandi, M, Peel, E, Belov, K, Boileau, A, Garg, S, Venter, H, Chan, WY, Hill, PB, Page, SW, Cowin, AJ & Trott, DJ 2018, 'Bioluminescent murine models of bacterial sepsis and scald wound infections for antimicrobial efficacy testing', PLoS One, vol. 13, no. 7, article no. e0200195, pp. 1-13. Open access 3 4 3
2018	Wang, Y, Mowla, R, Ji, S, Guo, L, De Barros Lopes, MA, Jin, C, Song, D, Ma, S & Venter, H 2018, 'Design, synthesis and biological activity evaluation of novel 4-subtituted 2-naphthamide derivatives as AcrB inhibitors', European Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, vol. 143, pp. 699-709. 10 6
2017	Arzanlou, M, Chai, WC & Venter, H 2017, 'Intrinsic, adaptive and acquired antimicrobial resistance in Gram-negative bacteria', Essays in Biochemistry, vol. 61, no. 1, pp. 49-59. 33 25 38
2017	Bi, F, Guo, L, Wang, Y, Venter, H, Semple, SJ, Liu, F & Ma, S 2017, 'Design, synthesis and biological activity evaluation of novel 2,6-difluorobenzamide derivatives through FtsZ inhibition', Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry Letters, vol. 27, no. 4, pp. 958-962. 16 14
2017	Khazandi, M, Deo, P, Ferro, S, Venter, H, Pi, H, Crabb, S, Amorico, T, Ogunniyi, AD & Trott, DJ 2017, 'Efficacy evaluation of a new water sanitizer for increasing the shelf life of Southern Australian King George whiting and Tasmanian atlantic salmon fillets', Food Microbiology, vol. 68, pp. 51-60. Open access 9 5 2
2017	Liu, F, Venter, H, Bi, F, Semple, SJ, Liu, J, Jin, C & Ma, S 2017, 'Synthesis and antibacterial activity of 5-methylphenanthridium derivatives as FtsZ inhibitors', Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry Letters, vol. 27, no. 15, pp. 3399-3402. 9 7
2017	Mahbub, KR, Krishnan, K, Andrews, S, Venter, H, Naidu, R & Megharaj, M 2017, 'Bio-augmentation and nutrient amendment decrease concentration of mercury in contaminated soil', Science of the Total Environment, vol. 576, pp. 303-309. 22 19
2017	Ogunniyi, AD, Khazandi, M, Stevens, AJ, Sims, SK, Page, SW, Garg, S, Venter, H, Powell, A, White, K, Petrovski, KR, Laven-Law, G, Tótoli, EG, Salgado, HR, Pi, H, Coombs, GW, Shinabarger, DL, Turnidge, JD, Paton, JC, McCluskey, A & Trott, DJ 2017, 'Evaluation of robenidine analog NCL195 as a novel broad-spectrum antibacterial agent', PLoS One, vol. 12, no. 9, article no. e0183457, pp. 1-23. Open access 14 13 2
2017	Venter, H, Henningsen, ML & Begg, SL 2017, 'Antimicrobial resistance in healthcare, agriculture and the environment: The biochemistry behind the headlines', Essays in Biochemistry, vol. 61, no. 1, pp. 1-10. Open access 34 26 2
2017	Wang, Y, Mowla, R, Guo, L, Ogunniyi, AD, Rahman, T, De Barros Lopes, MA, Ma, S & Venter, H 2017, 'Evaluation of a series of 2-napthamide derivatives as inhibitors of the drug efflux pump AcrB for the reversal of antimicrobial resistance', Bioorganic and Medicinal Chemistry Letters, vol. 27, no. 4, pp. 733-739. Open access 13 8
2016	Qiang, S, Wang, C, Venter, H, Li, X, Wang, Y, Guo, L, Ma, R & Ma, S 2016, 'Synthesis and biological evaluation of novel FtsZ-targeted 3-arylalkoxy-2,6-difluorobenzamides as potential antimicrobial agents', Chemical Biology and Drug Design, vol. 87, no. 2, pp. 257-264. Open access 4 3 3
2016	Seyedmohammad, S, Fuentealba, NA, Marriott, RA, Goetze, TA, Edwardson, JM, Barrera, NP & Venter, H 2016, 'Structural model of FeoB, the iron transporter from Pseudomonas aeruginosa, predicts a cysteine lined, GTP-gated pore', Bioscience Reports: Molecular and Cellular Biology of the Cell Surface, vol. 36, article no. 00322, pp. 1-13. Open access 9 7 3
2016	Wang, Y, Venter, H & Ma, S 2016, 'Efflux pump inhibitors: a novel approach to combat efflux-mediated drug resistance in bacteria', Current Drug Targets, vol. 17, no. 6, pp. 702-719. 37 35
2016	Yan, M, Ma, R, Jia, L, Venter, H & Ma, S 2016, 'Synthesis and antibacterial activity of novel 3-O-descladinosylazithromycin derivatives', European Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, vol. 127, pp. 874-884. 5 6 3
2015	Venter, R, Mowla, R, Ohene-Agyei, T & Ma, S 2015, 'RND-type drug efflux pumps from Gram-negative bacteria: molecular mechanism and inhibition', Frontiers in Microbiology, vol. 6, article no. 377, pp. 1-11. Open access 93 82 1
2014	Du, D, Wang, Z, James, NR, Voss, JE, Klimont, E, Ohene-Agyei, T, Venter, H, Chiu, W & Luisi, BF 2014, 'Structure of the AcrAB-TolC multidrug efflux pump', Nature, vol. 509, no. 7501, pp. 512-515. Open access 269 249 11
2014	Ohene-Agyei, T, Mowla, R, Rahman, T & Venter, R 2014, 'Phytochemicals increase the antibacterial activity of antibiotics by acting on a drug efflux pump0', MicrobiologyOpen, vol. 3, no. 6, pp. 885-896. Open access 37 36 4
2014	Seyedmohammad, S, Born, D & Venter, H 2014, 'Expression, purification and functional reconstitution of FeoB, the ferrous iron transporter from Pseudomonas aeruginosa', Protein Expression and Purification, vol. 101, pp. 138-145. 10 10
2012	Ohene-Agyei, T, Lea, JD & Venter, H 2012, 'Mutations in MexB that affect the efflux of antibiotics with cytoplasmic targets', FEMS Microbiology Letters, vol. 333, no. 1, pp. 20-27. Open access 19 17
2010	Welch, A, Awah, C, Jing, S, Van, VH & Venter, R 2010, 'Promiscuous partnering and independent activity of MexB, the multidrug transporter protein from Pseudomonas aeruginosa', Biochemical Journal, vol. 430, no. 2, pp. 355-364. Open access 31 29
2009	Barrera, NP, Isaacson, SC, Zhou, M, Bavro, VN, Welch, A, Schaedler, TA, Seeger, MA, Miguel, RN, Korkhov, VM, van Veen, HW, Venter, H, Walmsley, AR, Tate, CG & Robinson, C V 2009, 'Mass spectrometry of membrane transporters reveals subunit stoichiometry and interactions', Nature Methods, vol. 6 no. 8, pp. 585-587. Open access 125 120
2009	Velamakanni, S, Lau, CH, Gutmann, DA, Venter, H, Barrera, NP, Seeger, MA, Woebking, B, Matak-Vinkovic, D, Balakrishnan, L, Yao, Y, U, EC, Shilling, RA, Robinson, C V, Thorn, P & van, HHW 2009, 'A multidrug ABC transporter with a taste for salt', PLoS One, vol. 4 no. 7, article no. e6137, pp. 1-9. Open access 28
2008	Venter, H, Velamakanni, S, Balakrishnan, L & Van Veen, H 2008, 'On the energy-dependence of Hoechst 33342 transport by the ABC transporter LmrA', Biochemical Pharmacology, vol. 75, no. 4, pp. 866-874. 37 33

External engagement & recognition

Collaborations

Highlights

Guest Editor for a special issue on 'Antimicrobial Resistance' for Essays in Biochemistry
Member of the Editorial board of the 'Antimicrobials, Resistance and Chemotherapy', section of Frontiers in Microbiology

External engagement & recognition

Collaborations

Organisation	Country
Ardabil University of Medical Sciences	IRAN
Baylor College of Medicine	UNITED STATES
CRC Care	AUSTRALIA
Deakin University	AUSTRALIA
ECAS4 Australia	AUSTRALIA
Ecas4 Australia Pty Ltd	AUSTRALIA
Ecas4 Pty Ltd	AUSTRALIA
Flinders University	AUSTRALIA
Ghent University	BELGIUM
Goethe University Frankfurt	GERMANY
Luoda Pharma Pty Ltd	AUSTRALIA
Micromyx	UNITED STATES
Monash University	AUSTRALIA
Murdoch University	AUSTRALIA
Neoculi Pty Ltd	AUSTRALIA
Northern Technical University	IRAQ
Pontifical Catholic University of Chile	CHILE
Qingdao University	CHINA
Queen Elizabeth Hospital	AUSTRALIA
ReaLi Tide Biological Technology	CHINA
ReaLi Tide Biological Technology (Weihai) Co. Ltd	CHINA
Sao Paulo State University	BRAZIL
Shandong University	CHINA
South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI)	AUSTRALIA
South East Vets	UNITED STATES
University of Adelaide	AUSTRALIA
University of Cambridge	UNITED KINGDOM
University of Copenhagen	DENMARK
University of Durham	UNITED KINGDOM
University of Newcastle	AUSTRALIA
University of Oxford	UNITED KINGDOM
University of South Australia	AUSTRALIA
University of Sydney	AUSTRALIA

External engagement & recognition

Engagement/recognition	Year
Editorial Board Member ('Antimicrobials, Resistance and Chemotherapy') Frontiers in Microbiology	2017
Guest Editor for a special issue Essays in Biochemistry	2017
Member The Australian Society for Microbiology	2017
Member Australian Society for Antimicrobials	2017
Member Australian Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB)	2017
Member Adelaide Protein Group, Australian Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB)	2017
Member American Society for Microbiology	2017

Teaching & student supervision

Research degree supervision

Supervisions from 2010 shown

Thesis title	Student status
A combined in silico and microbiological approach for the identification of efflux pump inhibitors from natural products.	Current
Antimicrobial resistance and antimicrobial drug development	Current
Phenotypic screening and molecular characterization of Extended-Spectrum ß-Lactamase and Carbapenemase-Producing Klebsiella pneumoniae and identify mechanism of resistance	Current
Risk factors in the development and dissemination of antimicrobial resistance in residential age care facilities	Current
Targeting bacterial cellular division via FtsZ as an approach in the development of new antimicrobial agents	Current
The effect of hospital effluent on the antimicrobial resistance ecology of waste water.	Current
Inhibitors of efflux  to reverse resistance in Escherichia coli	Completed
Investigation of the activity of a caspofungin-grafted surface coating on attaching pathogenic fungi	Completed
Reversing multi-drug resistance with efflux pump inhibitors	Completed

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Associate Professor Rietie Venter

About me

About me

UniSA Clinical & Health Sciences

Other UniSA associations

About me

Professional Associations

Experience

Qualifications

Research

Research themes

Research focus

Highlights

Projects

Other projects

Outputs

Highlights

Chapters

Journal Articles

Current research & highlights

External engagement & recognition

Collaborations

Highlights

Collaborations

External engagement & recognition

Editorial Board Member ('Antimicrobials, Resistance and Chemotherapy')

Guest Editor for a special issue

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Teaching & student supervision

Courses and programs

Courses I teach and/or co-ordinate

Programs I'm associated with

Research degree supervision

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