SmithLabUMBC

So happy for you both 😁

Hijacking a bacterial ABC transporter for genetic code expansion - Nature Bacterial ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporters can be utilized and engineered to transport non-canonical amino acids into Escherichia coli for highly efficient synthesis of proteins with novel func...

🚨Our paper is out! 🥳
Hijacking a bacterial ABC transporter for efficient genetic code expansion.
Many congrats to everyone involved - a multi-year effort led by @taruniype.bsky.social @maxfottner.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

it all started years ago with a failed experiment
🧵👇 1/9

As U.S. shutdown drags on, ‘it’s just one blow after another’ Federal researchers confront growing uncertainty about future

"The pause has many academic researchers feeling anxious. The timing couldn’t be worse for Julie Kovacs, a bioinorganic chemist at the University of Washington (UW) whose grant proposal was slated to be reviewed on 23 October. Even if the... 1/2

www.science.org/content/arti...

Hopefully they are giving you a discount as the lifetime of the source continues to decrease!! 😬

Regarding the Compact | MIT Organization Chart The U.S. Department of Education recently sent MIT and eight other institutions a proposed “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education," along with a letter asking that MIT review the document.

👏 👏 👏

orgchart.mit.edu/letters/rega...

Unintended proteins can easily sneak into experiments, but cryo-EM shows surprising power to uncover these `off-target' proteins in great detail #CryoEM #ArnA #AcrB doi.org/10.1107/S205...

Critical evaluation of three cryo-EM structures of particulate methane monooxygenase by quantum refinement We have studied the copper sites in three cryogenic electron-microscopy structures of particulate methane monooxygenase with quantum refinement. We show that the CuA, CuC and CuD sites are correctly modelled and that the CuB site is mononuclear in all structures, whereas we find no support for copper in the suggested trinuclear active site or two sites in the so-called copper sponge in PDB entry 7ev9.

Gayathri Yuvaraj et al.: Critical evaluation of three cryo-EM structures of particulate methane monooxygenase by quantum refinement #QuantumRefinement #CryogenicElectronMicroscopy @lundsuni...#IUCr https://journals.iucr.org/paper?S2059798325008356

Hey, that's us! 😀

The structure of the full catalytic cycle of Vibrio cholerae NFeoB https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.10.06.680749v1

The structure of the full catalytic cycle of Vibrio cholerae NFeoB The acquisition of iron is critical for the survival and the virulence of numerous infectious pathogens, and most bacteria acquire ferrous iron (Fe2+) by utilizing the ferrous iron transport (Feo) sys...

🚨 Just out in @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social 🚨 Kate, Candice, and Mark's paper on the structure of the V. cholerae NFeoB NTPase catalytic cycle. Serendipity of a P1 spacegroup with 4 mols in the ASU played a role in capturing all the states, and Mg is pivotal! Read the paper here: tinyurl.com/263u9vtn

And let's not forget the "oh our grad program is special so we don't accept letters but instead here's a 100 question census of the applicant; please rank the applicant whether they are 'extra special', 'extra, extra special,' 'once in a lifetime talent,' or 'once in a century talent'?

A great opportunity to work with a great mentor!

Someone got pooped from helping us decorate for Halloween…🎃

🚨 Our 4th example of metalloallosteric regulation of kinase activity. Out today in @CellReports with @KJSsci. The ER stress sensor kinase PERK needs copper to work. Without copper, PERK can’t protect cells under stress. cell.com/cell-reports/p…

Not safe. Needs to add three-factor authentication...🫠

The NSF GRFP is now limited to undergrads and first-year grads The solicitation for the 2025 submission dates for the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program is out, with the first deadline of November 10 for life-sciences disciplines. The big news is that el…

The NSF GRFP is now limited to undergrads and first-year grads drugmonkey.wordpress.com/2025/09/26/t...

What if NIH had been 40% smaller? Replaying history with less NIH funding shows widespread impacts on drug-linked research

This may be the most important paper ever published about NIH funded research.

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

@rajat-jha.bsky.social

A Conserved Cia1–Cia2 Interface Mediates Client Recruitment in the Cytosolic Iron–Sulfur Cluster Assembly Pathway The cytosolic iron–sulfur cluster assembly (CIA) targeting complex maturates over 30 cytosolic and nuclear Fe–S proteins, raising the question of how a single complex recognizes such a diverse set of ...

New paper alert! We ID resides of CIA targeting complex that recruit clients - in contradiction to what was predicted from previous studies, we find it is the cia1-cia2 interface, not cia1 on its own, that mediates the interaction.

pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

RAD23B acquires a copper metalloadaptor function in amphibian-to-reptile evolution to increase metabolism and regulate genomic integrity Increasing brain complexity is a major step in the evolution of species. Here, we show that, in the transition from amphibians to reptiles, the DNA re…

Copper regulates the evolution of REM sleep and transition of animals from water to land! It all relies on a new “metalloadaptor” function for RAD23B linking Cu uptake to distribution to multiple Cu targets. Tong and Dan co-led this @cp-molcell.bsky.social story www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Copper acquisition in Bacillus subtilis involves Cu(II) exchange between YcnI and YcnJ The transition metal copper (Cu) is biologically essential across all three domains of life. Several Cu-dependent proteins and enzymes produced by the Gram-positive bacterium Bacillus subtilis have…

SBGrid's eLife paper received a citation in August from @fisherlab.bsky.social at @wesleyanuniversity.bsky.social in Journal of Biological Chemistry: Copper acquisition in Bacillus subtilis involves Cu(II) exchange between YcnI and YcnJ.

Read more here: buff.ly/myITTv8

#SBGrid #ScienceMatters

The generation and consequences of N-terminal proteoform diversity N-terminal proteoforms are protein variants with altered N termini that arise from RNA-driven processes, such as alternative promoter usage, splicing,…

New review on the generation and consequences of N-terminal proteoform diversity from Evan Morrison and Olivia Rissland | #N-degron #RNA @cp-cellreports.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

See our @natmicrobiol.nature.com News&Views on the publication from Yun Chen laboratory

A rapid writing exercise for María Negre Rodríguez, a PhD student in my group

Ecological function of phenazine in soil
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

#MicrobiomeEcology at #LeidenBiology

A Machine Learning Model for the Proteome-Wide Prediction of Lipid-Interacting Proteins Lipids are essential metabolites that play critical roles in multiple cellular pathways. Like many primary metabolites, mutations that disrupt lipid synthesis can be lethal. Proteins involved in lipid...

@jonathanccc-chem.bsky.social's predictor for discovering lipid interacting proteins is now in press - congratulations to all the authors!. We are delighted that SLiPP has spurred so many new research directions in the lab and nucleated many collaborations! pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

The 4th Annual Early Career Symposium at IBBR is Sept. 17th - Its a forum for graduate students & post-docs to share their scientific research in the fields of disease biology & biotherapeutics development & analysis - zurl.co/4oUyS We are sponsoring & exhibiting there

Exciting news 🎉! Notice of Award from NIH National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) for a new instrument in the National Crystallization Center! Stay tuned for more details... hint: 🦟 🤖
@getacrystal.bsky.social

Florida plans to end vaccine mandates statewide | CNN Florida will move to end all vaccine mandates in the state, Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo announced Wednesday.

JFC:

www.cnn.com/2025/09/03/h...

Minipreps eating up your day?

Skip the pipetting. Skip the spins.
Send your colonies and get full plasmid sequences the next morning. No prep needed.

Curious? Learn more about ZeroPrep: plasmidsaurus.com/products/zer...

The znu gene cluster and conserved motif.

Zinc is a critical nutrient for many bacterial pathogens. New research in #JBacteriology expands our understanding of a novel zinc transport system & provides evidence for an alternative mechanism of cell wall protein localization in C. diphtheriae. asm.social/2zf

Cool story on the re-purposing of a protein I worked on in graduate school! Curious about other work that led to this?

See:

tinyurl.com/56mybjmd
tinyurl.com/ksmau4xm
tinyurl.com/yw9av9yh
tinyurl.com/yuujhajc
tinyurl.com/5987f53r

Way to go Burstyn Group alumni!! And check out: tinyurl.com/mvvpzj3f