Vanni Lab at UNIFR, Switzerland

Wee thread 🧵⬇️ on our new #glycotime with @siglecdude.bsky.social John Klassen and @glycocode.bsky.social 🥳 where we show Siglecs as molecular precision tools, able to recognise sialylated glycans with surgical precision in their natural environment, not bad for a lectin! 😎

doi.org/10.1038/s420...

Biological Laboratory | LEGO® Ideas This is a two-floor realistic Biological Laboratory building. In this design, I try to tell stories about biologists, introduce biology concepts to general publ…

I just made an account and voted for this biology laboratory made of LEGO to "promote biological research and inspire more people into the world of biology". They need 10K votes. Reposting and/or voting below would be helpful. 🤗
beta.ideas.lego.com/product-idea...

Congratulations @olzmannlab.bsky.social @arrudalab.bsky.social! Really outstanding and important work!

Lipid scrambling: New players, new questions, new opportunities Nearly a quarter of the proteins encoded in most organisms are transmembrane proteins. Contrary to textbook description, many feature a hydrophilic gr…

Amazing PhD @cristianrocharoa.bsky.social
and I have collected our thoughts and questions (many!) on lipid scramblases in this review:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
If you are interested in lipid transport and metabolism, membrane asymmetry and membrane protein function, give it a read!

New preprint from the lab together with @labvanni.bsky.social. We looked what happens to ER generated free very long chain fatty acids.. VLCFAs are partionig into lipid droplets and are extracted from the hydrophobic core by Fat1.
www.biorxiv.org/content/bior...

PhD positions in my lab (AI for Science), but with special preference for people who complement our current activities or are enthusiastic about contributing to our on going work. Looking for technically strong, independent and proactive candidates. www.chalmers.se/en/about-cha...

Please REPOST (“likes” don’t help in diffusion!) and consider applying: we work in such a fantastic context, we ask so interesting questions, and we have such a collegial and best-willing atmosphere… CRBM = Happy & Good Science

Please share!!! I am looking for a postdoctoral researcher to join us. Focus will be on exciting collaborative projects on lipids and membrane biology, pushing the boundaries of in silico "reconstitutions". Previous experience with molecular dynamics simulations of biological systems a strong plus!

Master Projects DANGELOLAB

We have several Master’s thesis projects available in the D’Angelo lab, spanning different areas of lipid biology/biochemistry. If you know someone who might be interested, we’d really appreciate you sharing this. #lipidtime
www.epfl.ch/labs/dangelo...

Please share🙏:

Our lab opens 2 PhD positions to investigate fungi's evolution: #Barcelona

Wet lab in Biochemistry/Structural Biology of cryo-tolerant fungi
www.upf.edu/documents/d/...

Computational in Physical Chemistry of cellular processes under extrem environments
www.upf.edu/documents/d/...

I finally made my webpage, check it out: pilarcossio.org

New preprint from the lab! Triglycerides act like salt on ice: they solubilize cholesterol esters and drive lipid droplet growth. The TG/CE ratio shapes both droplet size and proteome, mirroring lipoprotein organization.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

The work by @danialv.bsky.social is now out in @pnas.org with a few changes after peer-review. Have a look if you are interested in lipid transport by bridge lipid transfer proteins (BLTPs)...
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Thanks André!

Finally, big congrats to all authors, including collaborators from the @pdc-lab.bsky.social, and thanks to @snsf.ch and @erc.europa.eu for funding this research line in my lab. Looking forward to your comments and feedback! (7/7)

Finally, @danialv.bsky.social used CG simulations to show that VPS13A can deliver lipids to an acceptor membrane that is bound at the C-terminal of VPS13A, and that XKR1 is proximal, but not continuous, to the delivery site. (6/7)

But how does VPS13A contact the lipid bilayer? Using a combination of coarse-grained (CG) MD simulation and in vitro flotation assay, we show that a disordered ATG2_C domain located in the C-terminal part of VPS13A is required for membrane binding. (5/7)

The plasma membrane scramblase XKR1 directly interacts with the PH domain of VPS13A. All-atom MD simulations show that this interaction promotes a conformational change in XKR1 which exposes a hydrophilic groove, that acts as the scrambling region (4/7)

The cryo-EM data reveal that the VAB domain of VPS13A can adapt distinct conformations. These are likely to modulate the lipid transfer ability of VPS13A, and this mechanism is probably conserved in similar BLTPs. (3/7)

The first step: at Yale, Bodan solved at near-atomic resolution the structure a prototypical BLTP, VSP13A, in complex with Calmodulin (CaM) and a plasma membrane scramblase, XKR1, demonstrating their physical interaction. (2/7)

Happy to finally share the amazing results of our long-term collaboration with Karin Reinisch’s lab on how bridge lipid-transfer proteins (BLTPs) cooperate with partner proteins to orchestrate lipid delivery. A quick thread (1/7)
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Experimental tour-de-force from Anne-Claude Gavin's lab: selectivity mapping of 39 lipid transfer proteins reveals ~500 new LTP-lipid pairs. Molecular modeling by @mahmoudmoqadam.bsky.social, @rezatalandahti.bsky.social & Florian Echelard. @cbubergen.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Join us for the 2026 Glycolipid & Sphingolipid Biology Gordon Research Conference (GRC).

📍 Renaissance Tuscany Il Ciocco (Italy)
🗓️ March 22 - 27, 2026

Theme: "Molecular Codes of Cell Identity and Recognition"
#LipidResearch #Sphingolipids #GRC2026 #ScienceConference #Lipidtime

Join us for a two-and-a-half-day meeting in the scenic Wye Valley, to discuss how membrane contact sites shape cellular homeostasis across organelles, organisms, and approaches.

📍 Chepstow, South Wales, UK | 🗓️ 28–30 September 2026

👉 :
www.eventsforce.net/biochemsoc/f...

TT in Experimental Biophysics

The Danish Institute for Advanced Study and the Dept of Physics, Chemistry and Pharmacy at the University of Southern Denmark is hiring a tenure track Assistant Professor in Biophysics or a related discipline

fa-eosd-saasfaprod1.fa.ocs.oraclecloud.com/hcmUI/Candid...

The Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) and the newly funded Cluster of Excellence SCALE are seeking several Independent Research Group Leaders to drive theoretical and computational research in molecular and cellular life science.

fias.institute/de/das-fias/...

Cryo-electron microscopy ensemble optimization using individual particles and physical constraints Biomolecules are inherently dynamic, and understanding their conformational ensemble distributions is essential for understanding their dynamics and biological roles. Cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM...

Happy to share our cryoEM Ensemble Optimization method! 🎉It infers optimal structures and their weights directly from individual cryoEM images - no maps just physics! with David Sliva-Sánchez, @erikhthiede.bsky.social & Roy Lederman www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

This is an exciting story! Happy to have contributed a little with @mudgal17.bsky.social. So many things we don't (yet) understand in membrane biology...

Thrilled to share that the work from @cristianrocharoa.bsky.social, identifying TMEM170 proteins as lipid scramblases that associate with bridge lipid transporters, is now out in @natsmb.nature.com
Unexpectedly, the scrambling pathway does not "feed" directly into the BLTP cavity...
rdcu.be/eRSst

ATG2A-mediated DAG transfer recruits DGAT2 for lipid droplet growth - Nature Structural & Molecular Biology Elhan et al. show that ATG2A acts with DGAT2, the enzyme producing triacylglycerol (TAG), in lipid droplet growth. By delivering diacylglycerol to lipid droplets, ATG2A not only fuels TAG production b...

Thrilled to share our latest work showing that the bridge lipid transport protein ATG2A transfers diacylglycerol (DAG), and some TAG/PA, from the ER to LDs, thereby recruiting DGAT2 to drive local TAG synthesis, promoting LD expansion while protecting ER membranes.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...