Dr. Tao Dong is a professor and associate dean in the School of Life Sciences at the Southern University of Science and Technology. He earned his BSc from Shandong University in 2003 and his PhD from McMaster University in 2010. Funded by the prestigious Banting Fellowship, he worked with John Mekalanos at Harvard Medical School from 2011 to 2013. Prior to SUSTech, he was a full professor and Canada Research Chair in Molecular Ecology of Waterborne Microbes at the University of Calgary. He also served as the department chair of Biochemistry at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Dr. Dong's research focuses on the molecular mechanisms that enable bacterial survival in diverse environments and their interactions with competing species. He is on the editorial boards of mLife and the Journal of Bacteriology.