I am a microbiologist with Bachelor and Master’s degrees from University College Cork, Ireland, and I earned a PhD from Imperial College London. My research includes antimicrobial resistance evolution in bacteria, antimicrobial combinations and antimicrobial peptides. I am interested in how and when bacteria evolve antimicrobial resistance and novel treatments and strategies which treat bacterial infections while limiting future resistance generation, to help alleviate the antimicrobial resistance crisis.

Peer-reviewed Publications

Murphy, R.A., Pizzato, J., Cuthbertson, L., Sabnis, Edwards, A.M., Nolan, L.M., Vorup-Jensen, T., Larrouy-Maumus, G.J. & Davies, J.C., 2024. Antimicrobial peptide glatiramer acetate targets Pseudomonas aeruginosa lipopolysaccharides to breach membranes without altering lipopolysaccharide modification. npj Antimicrobials and Resistance, 2(1), p.4. doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/s44259-024-00022-x.

Robinson, L., Collins, A.C., Murphy, R.A., Davies, J.C. & Allsopp, L.P., 2023. Diversity and prevalence of type VI secretion system effectors in clinical Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolates. Front Microbiol, p.4966. doi: https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.1042505.

Murphy, R.A., Coates, M., Thrane, S., Sabnis, A., Harrison, J., Schelenz, S., Edwards, A.M., Vorup-Jensen, T. & Davies, J.C., 2022. Synergistic Activity of Repurposed Peptide Drug Glatiramer Acetate with Tobramycin Against Cystic Fibrosis Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Microbiol Spectr Vol. 10, No. 4. doi: https://doi.org/10.1128/spectrum.00813-22.

Sabnis, A., Hagart, K.L., Klöckner, A., Becce, M., Evans, L.E., Furniss, R.C.D., Mavridou,D.A., Murphy, R., Stevens, M.M., Davies, J.C., Larrouy-Maumus, G.J., Clarke, T.B. & Edwards, A.M., 2021. Colistin kills bacteria by targeting lipopolysaccharide in the cytoplasmic membrane. elife, 10, p.e65836. doi: https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.65836.

Davies, J.C., Alton, E., Simbo, A., Murphy, R., Seth, I., Williams, K., Somerville, M., Jolly, L., Morant, S. & Guest, C., 2019. Training dogs to differentiate Pseudomonas aeruginosa from other cystic fibrosis bacterial pathogens: not to be sniffed at? Eur Respir J, 54(5). doi: https://doi.org/10.1183/13993003.00970-2019.

Spyridou, C., Ragab, H., Murphy, R.A., Riddell, A., Wilks, M., Millar, M.R. and Prendergast, A.J., 2019. Two cases of BCG osteomyelitis diagnosed through polymerase chain reaction/electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry technology. Clinical Infectious Diseases, 68(2), pp.350-350. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/cid/ciy105.

Turnbull, A.R., Murphy, R., Behrends, V., Lund-Palau, H., Simbo, A., Mariveles, M., Alton, E.W., Bush, A., Shoemark, A. and Davies, J.C., 2018. Impact of T2R38 receptor polymorphisms on Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection in cystic fibrosis. American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, 197(12), pp.1635-1638. doi: https://doi.org/10.1164/rccm.201711-2365LE.

Christiansen, S.H., Murphy, R.A., Juul-Madsen, K., Fredborg, M., Hvam, M.L., Axelgaard, E., Skovdal, S.M., Meyer, R.L., Sørensen, U.B.S., Möller, A. and Nyengaard, J.R., Nørskov-Lauritsen, N., Wang, M., Gadjeva, M., Howard, K.A., Davies, J.C., Petersen, E., & VorupJensen, T., 2017. The immunomodulatory drug glatiramer acetate is also an effective antimicrobial agent that kills gram-negative bacteria. Sci Rep, 7(1), pp.1-16. doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-15969-3.

Smith, W.D., Bardin, E., Cameron, L., Edmondson, C.L., Farrant, K.V., Martin, I., Murphy, R.A., Soren, O., Turnbull, A.R., Wierre-Gore, N. and Alton, E.W., 2017. Current and future therapies for Pseudomonas aeruginosa infection in patients with cystic fibrosis. FEMS microbiology letters, 364(14), p.fnx121. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/femsle/fnx121.

Zhou, Z., McCann, A., Litrup, E., Murphy, R., Cormican, M., Fanning, S., Brown, D., Guttman, D.S., Brisse, S. & Achtman, M., 2013. Neutral genomic microevolution of a recently emerged pathogen, Salmonella enterica serovar Agona. PLoS Genet, 9(4), p.e1003471. doi: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgen.1003471.

Achtman, M., Hale, J., Murphy, R.A., Boyd, E.F. and Porwollik, S., 2013. Population structures in the SARA and SARB reference collections of Salmonella enterica according to MLST, MLEE and microarray hybridization. Infection, Genetics and Evolution, 16, pp.314-325. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.meegid.2013.03.003.

O’Farrell, B., Haase, J.K., Velayudhan, V., Murphy, R.A. and Achtman, M., 2012. Transforming microbial genotyping: a robotic pipeline for genotyping bacterial strains. PLoS One, 7(10), p.e48022. doi: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0048022.

Haase, J.K., Murphy, R.A., Choudhury, K.R. and Achtman, M., 2011. Revival of Seeliger's historical ‘Special Listeria Culture Collection’. Environmental microbiology, 13(12), pp.3163-3171. doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1462-2920.2011.02610.x

Murphy, R.A. & Boyd, E.F., 2008. Three pathogenicity islands of Vibrio cholerae can excise from the chromosome and form circular intermediates. J Bacteriol, 190(2), pp.636-647. doi: https://doi.org/10.1128/JB.00562-07.

Other Publications

Keshavarz, M., Murphy, R.A. and Rolff, J., 2025. Antimicrobial peptides–ancient weapons and new drugs. The Biochemist, pp.1-3. doi: https://doi.org/10.1042/bio_2025_119.

Murphy R.A., Thrane S., Harrison J., Schelenz S., Vorup-Jensen T. & Davies J.C., 2021. Depolarisation of the Pseudomonas aeruginosa cytoplasmic membrane by Glatiramer acetate potentiates the antibacterial activity of tobramycin. J Cyst Fibros. Jan 1;20:S36. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/S1569-1993(21)01021-3.

Murphy, R.A., Christiansen, S.H., Sabnis, A., Schelenz, S., Vorup-Jensen, T., Davies, J.C., Edwards, A. and Wilton, S., 2019. GLATIRAMER ACETATE IS AN ANTIBIOTIC RESISTANCE BREAKER AGAINST CYSTIC FIBROSIS STRAINS OF PSEUDOMONAS AERUGINOSA VIA DISRUPTION OF THE BACTERIAL OUTER MEMBRANE. In 33rd Annual North American Cystic Fibrosis Conference. doi:

Murphy R.A., Harrison J., Tsikna L. & Davies J.C., 2018.The repurposed multiple sclerosis drug, glatiramer acetate, is an antibiotic resistance breaker in Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains from cystic fibrosis patients. J Cyst Fibros. Jun 1;17:S20. doi: 10.1016/S15691993(18)30181-4.