One of biggest mysteries in biology: how did complex eukaryotic cells evolve from simple microbes? ~1.8 billion years ago, an archaeal cell likely merged with a bacterium to form the first eukaryotic cell, but can we ever find direct evidence of this transformative event? 🦠 🚶♂️
Excited to share our new paper out today in @science.org 🎉
We show that HGT via natural competence drives diversification of chromosomal integrons in V. cholerae 🤩
Below a 🧵 on key findings incl. background on natural competence in V. cholerae 1/
#microsky #phagesky
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
- Postdoc Position in Structural Biology in USA
- Staff Associate II (Computational Structural Biology)
- Two PhD positions on amyloid fibril structure determination by cryo-EM
- Postdoc at the University of St Andrews
For these and more, visit the Instruct-ERIC website: instruct-eric.org/jobs
I am excited to share our most recent work collaborating with @centriolelab.bsky.social and @stearnslab.bsky.social to look at the ciliary base of mammalian multiciliated cells w/ cryo-ET, XL/MS, and U-ExM www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
🧬 Last call to join us in Cambridge for #EMBOMBoA26 (July 6th-10th)!
We are just one week away from the registration and abstract submission deadline for the EMBO Workshop on the Molecular Biology of Archaea!
We are delighted to announce that Paola Picotti has been awarded the Otto Naegeli prize for biomedical research!
otto-naegeli-preis.ch
Take a look at the fresh post-Easter paper about lipid regulation of NS5A, a key protein of the hepatitis C virus.
We were happy to contribute to the all-star team by Anna, Rebecca, James et al, spearheaded by Christoph Welsch.
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Cool experiment! “Using these “adaptation chips (aChips)” we exposed populations of two different soil-dwelling bacteria (Priestia megaterium and Streptomyces lydicus) to several farm soils in the Northeast US for up to two years, documenting mutations arising in the evolving populations.”
Dear colleagues, With deep sadness I share the news that Andreas Engel passed away last Wednesday, at the age of 82, after a courageous fight against an aggressive caner. Only half a year ago, he was out hiking in the Italian mountains with his wife Barbara, walking 160 km in a single week. Andreas trained as a physicist in Bern, Switzerland, before heading to John Hopkins University in Baltimore for his postdoctoral work. He then led a research group at the Biozentrum in Basel, and in 1985 took on the role of a group leader in research and development at Ilford Ltd. in Fribourg, Switzerland. In 1987, he joined forces with his colleague Ueli Aebi to establish the Maurice E. Müller Institute at the Biozentrum of the University of Basel. Together, Ueli and Andreas served as professors for structural biology there for almost a quarter century, leaving a lasting mark on the field of structural biology as we know it today. Andreas Engel was a true pioneer. He was among the first to apply atomic force microscopy (AFM) with the tip operating under water, and one of the earliest researchers to perform 3D reconstructions using scanning transmission electron microscopy, achieving remarkable high-resolution maps of porin 2D crystals by STEM. He became a leading expert in membrane protein 2D crystallization, and his group played a key role in the determination of the first aquaporin structure, in collaboration with Peter Agre and Yoshinori Fujiyoshi. As he approached retirement from Basel, Andreas founded the Center for Cellular Imaging and NanoAnalytics (C-CINA) of the University of Basel, which in 2009 operated among others one of the very early Titan Krios instruments. From 2008 also held a professorship at Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, followed by a position at TU Delft in the Netherlands in 2013. In 2020, he was among the founding members of CryoWrite, a company in Basel that he led as CEO until recently. His contributions to science, to the tools of str…
Photo of Andreas Engel
Sad news on the passing of Prof. Andreas Engel, a pioneer in the field of cryo-EM (shared with the 3DEM community by Henning Stahlberg).
Andreas' kindness, warmth, and enthusiasm for science and his colleagues will be missed.
DM: a simple solution to suppress air-water interface interactions in cryo-EM www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.04...
Phage receptor prediction from genome sequencing alone. Bacterial receptor (blue) interacting with phage proteins (purple) is shown here
📣Huge preprint 🔔
Today we share something our group has been working toward for a long time, led by @lucasmoriniere.bsky.social We asked can we predict which receptor a phage targets from its genome sequence alone? For most phages, we couldn’t. So Lucas set out to do something I had only dreamed of.
The newly established NeCEN Utrecht is looking for a #cryoEM scientist!
www.uu.nl/en/organisat...
Work with a new Krios 5 + pFIB and support cutting-edge life science research.
📍 Utrecht | 🗓 Apply by 30 April
Please share with your network!
Open postdoc position in my lab on HGT and interbacterial competition. We seek candidates with a PhD in microbiology (or related fields)+ strong 1st-author publications.
Curious, highly motivated, and dedicated team players ready to contribute fully are encouraged to apply. Details: tiny.cc/cz01101
Depictions of the structure of CDK11-cyclin L-SAP30BP. Four cryo-EM densities are shown at the top, two molecules models at the bottom. CDK11 is green, cyclin L is purple, and SAP30BP is yellow.
Have a look at our latest results on #CDK regulation, just posted as a pre-print! This study was spearheaded by PhD student Amy McGeoch. Amy has determined the #cryoEM structure of the CDK11-cyclin L-SAP30B complex, an important regulator of #spliceosome activation.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Happy to see the first paper from the lab published in the EMBO J today: link.springer.com/article/10.1...
In it, we reconstitute self-assembling cooperative oligomers of human Ndc80 and Ska kinetochore complexes that stabilise microtubule ends, and study these samples using cryoET and TIRF
fems-microbiology.org/european-aca...
I’m so honored to be an elected fellow of the EAM. It acknowledges the hard work of my fantastic team- they do the very hard experiments! To say thank you, we will go buy games for the lab to cover the sometimes long waiting times during microscope sessions!
Proper organelle regulation during mitosis is a must, but how do membrane-less condensates like PML bodies behave during cell division? In work led by Eric Aird, we found the balance of speckled proteins SP110 & SP100 to be the key. doi.org/10.1038/s415...
We're excited to announce the beta-release of #RELION-5.1! 🥳 This release has important updates on our #amyloid processing pipeline, as described in this preprint: doi.org/10.64898/202... There are also some tweaks for #teamtomo.
#OpenSoftwareAcceleratesScience
My new spiritual eukaryote is ciliate in Si helmet swimming towards North pole ⚔️. Definitely an amazing reading from Bolzoni et al. "Magnetoreception in a freshwater ciliate arises from endosymbiosis." 10.1038/s41467-026-70462-8 for #protistsonsky
Arp2/3-dependent actin assembly shapes endosomes and promotes intracellular trafficking in fission yeast
The work from Alejandro Melero @ameleroc.bsky.social and Miguel Basante-Bedoya just out in Current Biology.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
@biology-unige.bsky.social
Associate Senior Lecturer/Assistant Professor position in Molecular Microbiology available at Lund University, Sweden:
lu.varbi.com/en/what:job/...
Phylogenetic trees of representative thymidilate kinases, including putative polyphosphate kinanase 3 (PPK3) with mapped neighborhoods.
🧬 How do Crenarchaeota make and use polyphosphate?
In our new JBC paper we identify a new polyphosphate kinase family (PPK3) — a distinct heteromeric enzyme
doi.org/10.1016/j.jb...
🔬 A missing piece of the puzzle.
#Archaea #Biochemistry #Microbiology #Polyphosphate
Images of molecular models of ALG3 and ALG9 proteins with substates bound.
I’m very excited to share some newly published work that uncovers the molecular basis for oligomannose synthesis!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
We are excited to be recruiting into 3 Associate Professorship's in @oxfordbiochemistry.bsky.social. Come join us as a colleague and benefit from our vibrant and multidisciplinary environment. Reach out to me if you have any questions. Please repost! (tinyurl.com/48deybuu) (tinyurl.com/4pdvjaft).
This is a proud and exciting moment for me. Manon continues to redefine our understanding of pyrenoid biology, as she pushes the frontiers of #TeamTomo straight into the natural world around us 🌍🌊🌾🔬
Her new group at @gmivienna.bsky.social will explore fresh and impactful questions. Check it out! 🧪👩🔬
Join #EMBOCryoEM to get a comprehensive foundation in advanced single-particle and cellular tomography techniques – we'll cover the entire workflow from sample preparation to data collection and image processing.
https://s.embl.org/cry26-01-bl
Apply by: 11 May 2026
@embo.org
How can we tap into the enormous functional diversity of microbes on this planet?
Join us at EMBL Heidelberg (8–10 Dec 2026) to learn about ongoing efforts to decode gene function and organisation in human gut microbes, and present your science.
🌟Congrats to Serina Robinson on her appointment as Assistant Professor of #EnvironmentalBiochemistry! Her interdisciplinary #PFAS and enzyme‑modelling research will deepen our links with @eth-dbiol.bsky.social, D‑HEST and @eawag.bsky.social. #ETHZurich #Interdisciplinary
Photo credit: @ethz.ch
