The fourth National Symposium on Microbial Genetics was held in Hangzhou recently. Led by Pro. Deng, eight lab members participated in this symposium. Professor Deng presented a plenary lecture named "Microbial secondary metabolism: from combinatorial biosynthesis to synthetic biology", while associate professor Hongyu Ou and Xinyi He presented lectures on microbial comparative functional genomics and DNA phosphorothioation respectively in parallel sessions.