Yutong Zhang

Coooool！

Mast cell extracellular granules are bioactive condensates assembled by heparin and polyamine - Nature Chemical Biology Mast cells are immune cells that release membraneless mast cell extracellular granules (MCEGs) in response to allergic inflammation and pathogen infection. MCEGs are found to be condensates formed thr...

Mast cell extracellular granules are found to be condensates formed through sugar-metabolite interactions with elevated pH and higher metal concentration that enrich and enhance the activity of immune modulators, such as cytokines and proteases

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

2026 Fellows | Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Our mission is to make the world a better place through the advancement of scientific knowledge.

Congratulations to new Sloan Fellow @grant.rotskoff.cc @stanfordchemistry.bsky.social !!

sloan.org/fellowships/...

Happy Chinese New Year！🐴
A horse year 2026！

Nice cover！Happy Valentine’s Day😃

Excellent work！

How did life arise from simple chemical building blocks?

New #LMBResearch led by @edogia.bsky.social in @philholliger.bsky.social group has identified a small self-replicating ribozyme that could be the answer.

Read more: mrclmb.ac.uk/news-events/...

Decoding the proton veil around lysosomes - Nature Cell Biology A newly discovered acidic nanolayer that envelopes lysosomes reveals that proton gradients extend beyond the organelle lumen, identifying a nanoscale regulatory interface that links luminal pH, TMEM17...

Thank you for highlighting our work with very visionary perspectives! @mstagi.bsky.social @natcellbio.nature.com
Decoding the proton veil around lysosomes
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

😀

DNA nanodevices detect an acidic nanolayer on the lysosomal surface - Nature Cell Biology Tan and colleagues develop DNA nanodevices to detect the pH of the lysosomal outer surface, observing an acidic layer generated by TMEM175 that regulates lysosome positioning in response to changes in...

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

📢 #RSCChemBio is sponsoring two poster prizes at the EMBO-EMBL Chemical Biology Workshop 2026!

📅 8 - 11th September 2026
📍 EMBL Heidelberg, Germany
🔗 www.embl.org/about/i...

Submit your abstract by 2nd June 2026 to a part of the event!

EMBO #ChemicalBiology

Thanks!!😍😁☺️ Great tools!

Most importantly, the key is to figure out the downstream biosensor. By lyso-IP experiments that is to isolate lysosome in acidic buffer and neutral buffer, we found that RILP is recruited more under acidic pH buffer! We also figure out the potential site, by a seires of biochemistry experiments.

Lysosome mobility is considered to be luminal-pH related. However, we all know that, dynein and adaptor and proteins are assembled on the surface, therefore I guess, it is juxta-lysosome pH regulates lysosome pH. By experiments, we verified, yes, it is.

We also change the location of proton-sensitive dye on this DNA duplex, to change its distance from the lysosomal surface. We measure that how long it will take to reach the same pH with cytosol?
To our surprise, this acidic juxta-lysosome pH has a thickness!!

We then explored that, TMEM175, a proton-efflux channel, maintained this aicidic juxta-lysosome pH.
Knocking out TM175 increase it and verse vise. Stimulating TM175 will decrease juxta-lysosome pH, which is negligable in TM175-KO cells.

Then, by conjugating proton-based ratiometric small molecules on the DNA duplex, we measured that, the surface pH of lysosomes is lower than neutral cytosol! We named it juxta-lysosome pH. It is 0.2-0.7 pH unit lower than cytosol.

First step, we establish a platform technology via DNA nanotechnology on the lysosome surface.

@carolynbertozzi.bskyverified.social acidic nanolayer is finally out! thank you for enlightening me in Shanghai last summer!

DNA nanodevices detect an acidic nanolayer on the lysosomal surface - Nature Cell Biology Tan and colleagues develop DNA nanodevices to detect the pH of the lysosomal outer surface, observing an acidic layer generated by TMEM175 that regulates lysosome positioning in response to changes in...

Beyond thrilled to share my PhD work out today in @natcellbio.nature.com , uncovering a nanoscale acidic environment around lysosomes that controls their mobility through proton signaling.🥳🥳🥳

Great thanks to my advisors and excellent peers for helping me！

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

SPARK-seq: A high-throughput platform for aptamer discovery and kinetic profiling Cell surface proteins are key disease biomarkers and therapeutic targets, yet high-throughput methods for aptamer discovery targeting these proteins in situ remain limited. We introduce single-cell pe...

Congrats to my advisor Weihong and team！
doi.org/10.1126/scie...

Cheers！Finally get my doctoral diploma and become Dr.Zhang🥳🥳 Look forward！

That is interesting！Proton is magic-The most fundamental but important ion. I really like it🤩🤩🤩

I have another question that I'm curious very much. What do you think of the biology function of these pH gradient inside organelles compared to the uniform distributed pH we considered in the past？

excellent depict of organelle pH! Proton signaling is promising.

Molecular bioengineering of functional nucleic acids Nature Reviews Bioengineering, Published online: 17 October 2025; doi:10.1038/s44222-025-00361-yFunctional nucleic acids (FNAs) achieve specific target recognition, molecular binding and catalytic activity by folding into defined secondary and tertiary structures. This Review focuses on two major classes of FNAs — aptamers and DNAzymes — and discusses their structural features, production strategies and engineering approaches as well as their clinical applications in diagnostics, targeted therapy and precision medicine.

ICYMI: Molecular bioengineering of functional nucleic acids

First time to make an offline flash talk to present my PhD work🤩🤓 Really good opportunity😍

Glad to share my work and to receive first prize award of poster
！🤩🤩🤩

World’s most porous sponges: intricate carbon-trapping powders hit the market Metal-organic frameworks were the next big thing in chemistry when they were invented more than three decades ago. Now, these intriguing materials are becoming commercial tools for capturing carbon dioxide and harvesting water from the air.

These intriguing materials - the world's most porous sponges - won today's Nobel Prize in Chemistry

go.nature.com/3VVjXug