Thanks Lutz

🚨New course alert!

Discover how to go from raw small RNA-seq data to high-quality microRNA annotations in our hands-on online course with @frommlab.bsky.social (6–9 Oct).

www.physalia-courses.org/courses-work...

#Bioinformatics #RNAseq #MicroRNA #Genomics

Second day of #Biocuration2026 started with workshop on data commons, meshes and Hubs with Gen3

@pedromartinezserra.bsky.social presenting cool work on tunicate phylogeny and more during the annual seminar in Natural Sciences at the Museum here in Tromsø

Come join us in Stockholm as a PhD student for the next 4 years!

Wikipedia Bans AI-Generated Content “In recent months, more and more administrative reports centered on LLM-related issues, and editors were being overwhelmed.”

after much deliberation and giving AI the benefit of the doubt, Wikipedia editors have had enough of AI slop. New policy bans LLM generated content, periodt www.404media.co/wikipedia-ba...

Very nice tthat the invited review 'A renaissance of microRNAs as taxonomic and phylogenetic markers in animals' by B. Fromm met the interest of our readers and is among the top downloaded papers 2024/2025. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

@frommlab.bsky.social @wileyecology.bsky.social

Transcript diversity reflects deleterious RNA processing errors shaped by population size in metazoans Alternative transcription initiation, splicing and polyadenylation generate extensive transcript diversity in eukaryotes, but its evolutionary significance has been disputed. This study analyses 166 t...

Back in the noughties when I was an academic, my lab did quite a bit of work on (conserved) alternative transcripts. This study in @plosbiology.org presents compelling evidence that most alternative transcripts are deleterious noise journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

This highlights the roles of non-coding gene regulators in the evolution of animal complexity.

Instead, body plan evolution is driven by changes in regulatory networks—not just gene gain or loss.

Take-home: evolution of animal form is about how gene regulatory systems are organized and deployed—not gene number.

Great collaboration with Kevin J. Peterson, Alexander Clarke, @zolotarg.bsky.social, Bradley Deline & @pedromartinezserra.bsky.social. Thanks to Trond Mohn Research Foundation & UiT.

Instead, body plan evolution is driven by changes in regulatory networks—not just gene gain or loss.

We also see widespread gene loss, especially in parasitic lineages.

🔥Strikingly, microRNA innovation strongly correlates with organismal complexity.🔥

In our new paper, we tackle a classic question in evolutionary biology: how does the genotype–phenotype map shape animal diversity?

Annotating and comparing regulatory & housekeeping genes across 32 animal species, we find no simple link between genome content and morphological disparity.

🔥 New Paper out 🔥

How do genomes give rise to the diversity of life we see around us?

#EvolutionaryBiology #Genomics #EvoDevo #microRNA #Evolution #SystemsBiology

www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10....

The E3 ubiquitin ligase mechanism specifying targeted microRNA degradation - Nature Target-directed microRNA degradation is driven by the atypical ZSWIM8–CUL3 E3 ubiquitin ligase that uses a two-RNA-factor authentication mechanism to specifically recognize AGO–miRNA–trigger RNA complexes and polyubiquitylate AGO.

Nature research paper: The E3 ubiquitin ligase mechanism specifying targeted microRNA degradation

go.nature.com/4seIEQN

Our work on the E3 ligase mechanism of target-directed microRNA degradation is now published! Amazing collaboration with Brenda Schulman’s lab led by @jakobfarnung.bsky.social and @elenaslo.bsky.social, with special thanks to @wyppeter.bsky.social, Lianne Blodgett, and Daniel Lin! tinyurl.com/Z8TDMD

The E3 ubiquitin ligase mechanism specifying target-directed microRNA degradation (TDMD) is now published! 🎉🍾 We, @bartellab.bsky.social and Schulman lab, describe how 2-RNA factors control protein degradation by recruiting an E3 ligase. @mpibiochem.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

This is a step forwards into the world of accurate complex models by AI m, at scale, openly distributed. Excellent work by the consortium here !

Word!

Some of the main components of Nucleic acids found on asteroids.

Wow! Beautiful story on the serial homologous origin of fins

Head of Engineering, DiSSCo UK:South Kensington Do you want to be part of an exciting programme enabling critical research into biodiversity and climate change? Come and join us as the new Lead Developer for the DiSSCo UK programme.

Head of Engineering, DiSSCo UK based at @nhm-london.bsky.social "This is a rare opportunity to shape the national digital platform that will underpin the UK’s contribution to DiSSCo and unlock the potential of over 140 million natural science collection items." jobs.nhm.ac.uk/Job/JobDetai...

Three people wearing fluorescent winter clothing stand with coring equipment in the snow

ArcEcoGen making headlines! Our researchers drilled sediment cores from the bottom of Lake Asklundvatnet to read a natural archive of the past ~3000 years
www.frostingen.no/overraskende...

DICER cleavage fidelity is governed by 5′-end binding pockets - Nature Cryo-electron microscopy and massively parallel assays shed light on the mechanism by which DICER, a key enzyme in the RNase III family, cleaves RNA at precise locations to produce small RNAs.

this seems to be a very interesting paper on the (reality) and the significance of 5'G micorRNAs for Dicer processing

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Accessory microRNA byproducts expand RNA interference via microprocessor-mediated cleavage activation Insights into microRNA processing guide the design of an RNA medicine strategy that enables precise multitargeting against cancer.

Curious paper!

„Accessory microRNA byproducts expand RNA interference via microprocessor-mediated cleavage activation“

I was thinking offset reads first, but this does not look like it? Thoughts?

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

One of the biggest questions in biology is how complex cells evolved about 2 billion years ago. Here's my new story on how scientists are solving the mystery of eukaryotes like us. Gift link: nyti.ms/4qMbo22

Trying to sort out a vexing issue:

What a Gene Regulatory Network Is — and What It Is Not ! thenode.biologists.com/what-a-gene-...

See who is back!! @pedromartinezserra.bsky.social

new paper from the Lai lab! Renfu Shang performs careful mechanistic dissection of miRNA cluster assistance and reveals many insights and surprises to this enigmatic regulatory strategy that gives suboptimal miRNAs a boost. if you love Northerns, you'll ♥️ this! 🧬

genesdev.cshlp.org/content/earl...

Happy to see our study out! We define the sequence determinants for miRNA-target interactions in flies and provide a foundation for improving computational prediction of miRNA-mediated regulation in Drosophila.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
#miRNA, @natcomms.nature.com, @rti-umasschan.bsky.social