Bret Freudenthal's Avatar

Bret Freudenthal

@freudlab.bsky.social

Professor studying the interplay between DNA damage and human health. WY➡️CSU➡️UI➡️NIEHS➡️KU. Personal posts from science to society.

730 Followers  |  761 Following  |  73 Posts  |  Joined: 04.12.2023  |  1.6708

Latest posts by freudlab.bsky.social on Bluesky


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Wonderful few days skiing in New Mexico. Every trip the boys get stronger, more controlled, and confident. It is fun to watch the progression in real time. Some fresh snow helped too!

17.02.2026 01:12 — 👍 2    🔁 0    💬 1    📌 0

So, to wrap up today's insanity:

President Trump, who is deeply implicated in a pedophilia scandal involving his best friend, the sex trafficker, sent Attorney General Bondi -- who only has that job because Trump's first choice was also implicated in a separate pedophilia scandal -- to the House...

11.02.2026 21:45 — 👍 3193    🔁 758    💬 42    📌 28
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“What do you think the odds are that person is a goat fucker?!”

Grade A trolling

04.02.2026 23:36 — 👍 376    🔁 154    💬 16    📌 26

Such a great conference for trainees and early career scientists.

Going back for the first time last year (since leaving the Midwest) this conference felt like home. Such a wonderful supportive DNA repair community.

Awesome science and even better people!!

04.02.2026 07:53 — 👍 1    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0

This 👇is such a great opportunity for young scientists in the field. I “grew up” on this conference & still hold so many meaningful relationships to this day that I made at these conferences.

04.02.2026 03:34 — 👍 4    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0

Great conference!!

03.02.2026 21:07 — 👍 2    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0
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📣 The 2026 Midwest DNA Repair Symposium is coming to Kansas City (registration is open)

🗓 May 30–31, 2026

✨ Talks will be selected from abstracts, with a strong focus on trainees and new investigators.

Please RT & share with your labs!
🔗 sites.google.com/view/kumc-mi...

03.02.2026 20:41 — 👍 12    🔁 13    💬 0    📌 3

Thanks CJ!

28.01.2026 13:56 — 👍 1    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 1
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Effects of ribonucleotides on telomeric G4 formation, dynamics, and initiation of ribonucleotide excision repair by RNase H2 Abstract. Human telomeres are composed of TTAGGG repeats that can fold into G-quadruplexes (G4s). G4s can form several different conformations, including p

🎉Kicking off 2026 with our first paper from the Freudenthal lab in NAR. Ribonucleotides reshape telomeric G4s and are resistant to RNase H2 repair. Congrats to the authors and huge thanks to our collaborator Hui-Ting Lee! academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

27.01.2026 22:03 — 👍 23    🔁 6    💬 1    📌 1
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Fun filled weekend in San Diego and LA! Really nice to escape the cold and catch up with Mark and Amiel.

21.01.2026 02:34 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

Thanks!

20.01.2026 15:15 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

So true!

20.01.2026 15:15 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

I tend to mostly post positive lab outcomes, but not every update is a win. Received my first not discussed grant score of the year. Part of the process and still plenty of year left. 🤞January has been a month. 😞

15.01.2026 23:09 — 👍 5    🔁 0    💬 2    📌 0
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Minneapolis schools cancel classes after Border Patrol clash disrupts dismissal at Roosevelt Minneapolis schools closed for the week citing safety concerns after an encounter involving armed Border Patrol agents near Roosevelt High School.

Minneapolis public schools canceled classes officials after Roosevelt High School said armed Border Patrol officers came on school property during dismissal Wednesday and began tackling people, handcuffed two staff members and released chemical weapons on bystanders
www.mprnews.org/story/2026/0...

08.01.2026 13:13 — 👍 2395    🔁 1329    💬 127    📌 266

Is NHEJ truly a double-strand break repair pathway...repairing both strands, at the same time?

16.12.2025 17:36 — 👍 4    🔁 1    💬 1    📌 0
Telomere function and maintenance in health and disease Telomeres are specialized structures that protect the ends of linear chromosomes in eukaryotes. Research in this area has revealed that telomere maintenance is critical for stem cell function and nor…

📢 Telomere community: Registration and abstract submission are now open for the EMBO Workshop “Telomere function and maintenance in health and disease”, May 25–30, 2026, in Lazise, Italy 🇮🇹. Looking forward to an exciting meeting! Please re-post. meetings.embo.org/event/26-tel...

15.12.2025 17:57 — 👍 19    🔁 17    💬 0    📌 0

Amazing to see the C-Trap in action! We’re proud that the C-Trap plays a part in supporting cancer research in
@freudlab.bsky.social lab at @kucancercenter.bsky.social! 🙌

25.11.2025 07:16 — 👍 1    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0
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Grateful to host Sen. Moran and NIH Director Jay Bhattacharyya in the lab today. Proud of our trainees, who showcased their work using the @lumicks.bsky.social C-Trap and the KU Cryo-EM Facility. Their dedication shows how federal investment drives cancer research at @kucancercenter.bsky.social.

22.11.2025 13:53 — 👍 8    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 1
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Proteome-wide in silico screening for human protein-protein interactions Protein-protein interactions (PPIs) drive virtually all biological processes, yet most PPIs have not been identified and even more remain structurally unresolved. We developed a two-step computational...

Thrilled to share that the final piece of my PhD work is now on bioRxiv! biorxiv.org/content/10.1... With support from @nvidia and the @NSF, we used AlphaFold to screen 1.6M+ protein pairs, revealing thousands of potential novel PPIs. All data can be viewed at predictomes.org/hp

12.11.2025 21:26 — 👍 163    🔁 67    💬 5    📌 4
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They’ve laid off so many people that the government is now getting its economic data from DoorDash.

12.11.2025 01:09 — 👍 20169    🔁 5238    💬 1346    📌 758

Check out the perspective my lab wrote with @freudlab.bsky.social. We provide our perspective on recent work describing the structural basis of chromatin-based base excision repair!

04.11.2025 11:10 — 👍 9    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0
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Base excision repair in chromatin: A tug-of-war for DNA damage Base excision repair (BER) is a genome surveillance pathway responsible for repairing DNA base lesions distributed throughout the chromatinized eukary…

🎉 Joint paper from the Freudenthal and @tmweaver.bsky.social Labs!
Abbey Vito’s first publication discusses a tug-of-war between BER enzymes and chromatin for access to damaged DNA, a battle central to genome stability.
Built on Tyler's foundational work! tinyurl.com/ywkt2bt5

03.11.2025 15:47 — 👍 10    🔁 3    💬 0    📌 1

It was wonderful hosting you for the seminar visit! Also appreciate you being a good sport for having an anglerfish introduce you.🤣

02.11.2025 00:03 — 👍 7    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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🎃 Happy Halloween from the Freudenthal Lab! 🐟🖤

Anglerfish PI + Emo Researchers = Bioluminescent Despair #Scienceunderpressure

31.10.2025 16:43 — 👍 6    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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One of my favorite activities of the year is our annual pumpkin carving competition with the Bose Lab. Everyone’s pumpkins were amazing!

29.10.2025 21:42 — 👍 6    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

I think people adjacent to science (but who now find themselves deciding the fate of US science somehow) undervalue humility, valuing braggadocios hubris instead.
Yes it’s true that some scientific discoveries are complete paradigm changers, and we celebrate these. 1/

16.10.2025 16:11 — 👍 148    🔁 46    💬 2    📌 3

By far. Juvenile.

17.10.2025 01:27 — 👍 15    🔁 5    💬 1    📌 1
satire: a spirit halloween costume that’s a “violent antifa terrorist” and includes:
- inflatable frog suit
- cape
- pepper spray filter
- a thirst for the blood of the innocent
- air pump

batteries and Molotov cocktails not included

satire: a spirit halloween costume that’s a “violent antifa terrorist” and includes: - inflatable frog suit - cape - pepper spray filter - a thirst for the blood of the innocent - air pump batteries and Molotov cocktails not included

whoever did this little bit of magnificence, take a bow

14.10.2025 17:48 — 👍 11985    🔁 2479    💬 133    📌 105
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Spread the word if you can.
We have an unused stopped flow accessory from Applied Photophysics. We traded in our Chirascan CD instrument so we have no use for this anymore. Reach out if you are interested and can find a home for this setup. Will ofcourse only work with a Chirascan!

08.10.2025 15:14 — 👍 7    🔁 9    💬 0    📌 0
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The Sangre de Cristo Mountains outside Santa Fe were beautiful today! Wonderful day for a hike.

11.10.2025 02:12 — 👍 5    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

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