Scott Rush

Generation of antigen-specific paired-chain antibodies using large language models MAGE is a sequence-based protein language model designed to generate diverse human antibody sequences targeting various pathogens, including SARS-CoV-2, H5N1, and RSV-A. This AI-driven approach addresses traditional limitations by enabling efficient, target-agnostic antibody design with experimentally validated binding specificity.

Now online! Generation of antigen-specific paired-chain antibodies using large language models

Our new preprint is out 🥳🥳🥳

Henipaviruses, like Nipah and Hendra, package their genomes inside helical shells built by thousands of nucleoproteins. These nucleocapsids are essential to protect the viral RNA, but how do they ever let the polymerase in to read the sequence?

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B lymphocytes that enter the germinal center late preferentially differentiate into memory cells that recognize subdominant epitopes https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.10.30.685663v1

Cryo-EM maps and atomic models of the biotin-containing 3-methylcrotonyl-CoA carboxylase (MCC) complex and long-chain acyl-CoA carboxylase (LCC) complex

New lab preprint!
@zestytoast.bsky.social tagged a scarce mycobacterial protein in M. smegmatis with TwinStep but got… something? @kjamali.bsky.social's ModelAngelo built models & @martinsteinegger.bsky.social's FoldSeek IDed them as the biotin-containing MCC & LCC complexes
🧵
tinyurl.com/ukny4ptz

Antibodies blocking PlGF or VEGF interactions with the NRP1 receptormediate anti-proliferative effects https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.10.25.684565v1

Mysteries of trafficking of the vRNP segmented genome and assembly of influenza A virus revealed by in situ cryo-ET!
🔗 rdcu.be/eMmct
We are very excited that our paper is finally out!
🎉 Big congratulations to Moritz Wachsmuth-Melm and to everyone involved.

Tenure-based Research Staff Scientist Position in Computational Structural Biology ISTA (www.ista.ac.at) is seeking a highly skilled Staff Scientist in Computational Structural Biology to support and advance the Institute’s structural biology research through the development and imp...

ISTA @istaresearch.bsky.social is hiring a tenure-track staff scientist in Computational Structural Biology, to develop tools for cryo-EM, cryo-ET, structural prediction methods and protein interaction analysis!

Please spread the word!

ista.ac.at/en/job/tenur...

Cryo-EM structure of endogenous Pfs230:Pfs48/45 complex with six antibodies reveals mechanisms of malaria transmission-blocking activity The Pfs230:Pfs48/45 complex is the target of leading anti-malaria transmission-blocking vaccine candidates, yet its molecular assembly is poorly understood. Bekkering, Yoo, Hailemariam, et al. determined the cryo-electron microscopy structure of the endogenous Pfs230:Pfs48/45 complex bound to six potent transmission-blocking antibodies, providing a structural basis for antibody inhibition and blueprints for the design of next-generation malaria vaccines.

Online now: Cryo-EM structure of endogenous Pfs230:Pfs48/45 complex with six antibodies reveals mechanisms of malaria transmission-blocking activity

I'm honored to receive a MacArthur Fellowship. As always, I extend my sincerest thanks to all my wonderful mentors, colleagues, collaborators, admins, and trainees who make this work possible. #MacFellow

Assistant/Associate Professor in Structural Biology, Biophysics or Biological Imaging

www.biozentrum.unibas.ch/open-positio...

#biozentrum #University #Basel #Professor #Structural #Biology #Biophysics #Biological #Imaging

I am excited to share our new preprint on the CAGE complex, a mysterious hollow protein complex that I first saw years ago while surveying Tetrahymena ciliary lysate www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... #cilia #protistsonsky 🧬🧪

Join us for the Austrian Cryo-EM Symposium Nov 11–12 at @istaresearch.bsky.social!

Top speakers, cutting-edge cryo-EM, and a chance to explore Vienna & the ISTA campus.

Register now 👉 cryoem-symposium.pages.ist.ac.at #cryoEM #teamtomo

Structural Basis for Childhood Antibody Recognition of The Human Metapneumovirus Fusion Protein https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.08.29.673069v1

Our preprint, in collaboration with Rino Rappuoli & Emanuele Andreano, is out! Co-led by colleagues at TLS, my grad student Ling Zhou @lingzhou.bsky.social, and postdoc Emily Rundlet @cryoemily.bsky.social, we identified OPG153 as a poxvirus bnAb target via B cell isolation & AlphaFold3 prediction.

Thrilled to announce the nexy Austrian Cryo-EM Symposium, taking place 11th-12th November at @istaresearch.bsky.social, with speakers inc. @grigoriefflab.bsky.social, @oliveiramann.bsky.social, @bjgreber.bsky.social @svenklumpe.bsky.social @sebastianglatt.bsky.social ‪‬https://tinyurl.com/cryo2025

Stabilization of H5 highly pathogenic avian influenza hemagglutinin improves vaccine-elicited neutralizing antibody responses Transmission of highly pathogenic avian influenza from H5 clade 2.3.4.4b has expanded in recent years to infect large populations of birds and mammals, heightening the risk of a human pandemic. Influe...

🚨 New paper alert! 🚨

Here we show that stabilized influenza hemagglutinin HPAI H5 immunogens improve the quality of elicited antibody responses. Thank you to @open_phil for funding this work! bit.ly/4lgr0rM

🚨 new paper alert 🚨

Here, we present a method for designing protein nanoparticles with two unique faces that can bring together distinct biological targets at controlled distances!

This project was led by Dr. Sanela Rankovic is out now in Nature Materials: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Predicting the translation efficiency of messenger RNA in mammalian cells Nature Biotechnology - A deep convolutional neural network model predicts the influence of the full-length mRNA sequence on translation efficiency.

Very excited that our most significant work, a collaboration w/ Dr. Can Cenik at UT Austin on translational gene regulation, was finally published in Nature Biotechnology in a dual set of studies:

Paper 1 -- an AI model trained to predict translation rates from mRNA sequences: rdcu.be/exN1l

Design of intrinsically disordered region binding proteins Intrinsically disordered proteins and peptides play key roles in biology, but a lack of defined structures and high variability in sequence and conformational preferences have made targeting such syst...

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

Atomic-resolution structure of a chimeric Powassan tick-borne flavivirus The 2.8-Å resolution structure is presented for a chimeric construct of an emerging tick-borne flavivirus, Powassan virus.

New in @science.org
We built a safe, atomic-resolution version of the Powassan virus—a deadly tick-borne #flavivirus with no vaccine.
✅ First structure ever
✅ Safe to handle (BSL-2)
✅ Platform for vaccines & antivirals

Let me show you 🧵 (1/5)

Link: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

CryoET tomogram with the gap junction (green), ribosomes (cyan) and microtubules (pink)

In our latest preprint on bioRxiv, we present the in situ structure of
the human gap junction at 14 Å resolution using cryo-ET.

The structure provides a blueprint for investigating how connexin
regulation shapes intercellular communication in health and disease.

Postdoc Research Group Schur The Schur lab at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) has an open postdoc position for a highly motivated candidate to be part of our ERC-funded project ActinID. Our Group ...

We're hiring a postdoc!
Join our ActinID project to explore an uncharacterized actin-binding protein.

- Background in cell and/or structural biology?
- Eager to bridge both fields?

Get in touch if you're curious or have questions!
#cellbiology #cryoEM #cryoET #actin

ista.ac.at/en/job/postd...

Check our recent works for near-atomic resolution structure of ANDV tetramers by cryoEM!

Our latest preprint is now available doi.org/10.1101/2025...! Led by my postdoc, Luqiang Guo @luqiang.bsky.social, we determined a ~2.4 A resolution structure of the hantavirus glycoprotein tetramer on the surface of VLPs. Also determined structures of dimers of tetramers and Fab-bound tetramers.

Excited to unveil Boltz-2, our new model capable not only of predicting structures but also binding affinities! Boltz-2 is the first AI model to approach the performance of FEP simulations while being more than 1000x faster! All open-sourced under MIT license! A thread… 🤗🚀

Native-like soluble E1E2 glycoprotein heterodimers on self-assembling protein nanoparticles for hepatitis C virus vaccine design pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40463071/ #cryoEM

If anyone is at #RNA2025, please stop by my lab’s posters on triphosphate balance and virus infection and tracking persistent infection with precision to identify viral miRNA functions.

Authors Szymanik and Mojumder are really great and are presenting in the second session this Friday from 8-10.

Check out our latest study, led by grad student Ryan McCool @rmccool.bsky.social‬, in collaboration with Vaccine Company. We were able to stabilize EBV gB in the prefusion conformation, determine its cryo-EM structure to 3.1 A, and assess its immunogenicity in mice. www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

Design, Structure, and Immunogenicity of a Soluble Prefusion-stabilized EBV gB Antigen www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.05.19.654955v1 #cryoEM

A neutralizing human antibody induces movement of the HCoV-229E receptor binding domain HCoV-229E is an endemic Alphacoronavirus that typically causes common cold-like disease in most healthy adults, but can also cause severe respiratory disease in the very young and the elderly. Althoug...

Very excited to share our latest preprint describing the isolation and characterization of neutralizing HCoV-229E-directed antibodies from a human donor! Great collaboration between DHVI and the Baric and Sheahan (@timothysheahan.bsky.social) labs at UNC.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...