Sebastian Baumgarten

Innate immune responses to Plasmodium falciparum disrupt the blood-brain barrier Plasmodium falciparum accumulation at the blood-brain barrier (BBB) is a hallmark of cerebral malaria, a life-threatening complication. Conversely, the contribution of the immune response to vascular ...

Pre-print alert 🚨
We answer a longstanding question in the field. Do immune cells cause cerebral malaria?

The answer is YES!!!! And independently of P. falciparum accumulation in the brain.

www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

Beautiful beasts: excited to see our first volume electron microscopy study on malaria parasites published: advanced.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/... revealing new insights into Plasmodium ookinete development. Thanks for great EMBL-Umea-Heidelberg collaboration.

Come apply with us to unravel some beautiful malaria genetics! This is a great program with plenty benefits specifically for international students

Parasite genome organization: come together, right now! Links between genome organization and transcription have been extensively studied in model eukaryotes; however, recent application of state-of-the-art chromosome conformation capture techniques to kin...

We @singh-parul.bsky.social teamed up with the amazing @fariatrypslab.bsky.social @trypsleon.bsky.social to highlight how recent technological advances have revealed exciting new features of parasite genome architecture and its impact on survival and pathogenicity:

www.cell.com/trends/paras...

Plasmodium falciparum egress disrupts endothelial junctions and activates JAK-STAT signaling in a microvascular 3D blood-brain barrier model Nature Communications - Here the authors show that Plasmodium falciparum egress products disrupt endothelial barrier and activate JAK-STAT and interferon type response in a 3D blood-brain barrier...

We are happy to show one ourt first exciting papers. We have developed a blood-brain barrier model to study the disruptive effects caused by the malaria parasite, Plasmodium falciparum.

First, congratulations to the fearless @liviapiatti.bsky.social and @alinabatzi.bsky.social

rdcu.be/ezBl7

🚨 2-year post-doc position available in my lab. More details below. Please repost!

acrobat.adobe.com/id/urn:aaid:...

A two year post-doctoral position at the BacterialGenome Plasticity Unit starting October 1st - Research

A 2-year postdoc position in my lab, under the supervision of P-Alex Kaminski, on Z-DNA phages and the benefit given by ZTGC DNA and the replication machinery, with attempt to create a Z based minireplicon
research.pasteur.fr/en/job/a-two...

📣 I'm recruiting a postdoc researcher to join my team for a project on mosquito-specific viruses and host interactions. Peep the job description & how to apply below. Perfect for soon-to-be or recent PhD graduates in mosquito vector biology 🦟 or arbovirology 🦠
🗓️ Application deadline 31 August 2025

Preprint Alert 🚨 Check out the latest piece of work from the @kirkdeitsch.bsky.social lab, where we characterized the sophisticated molecular layers controlling var2csa expression and antigenic variation in P. falciparum

Pre-print alert 🚨: We have developed 2D and 3D stable iPSC endothelial-differentiation models through dox inducible ETS expression. We demonstrate endothelial identity and used these models for studying malaria pathogenesis research. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

June was a productive month: brought two things into this world, both of which were great collaborative efforts and about nine months in the making. Check out where we map P. falciparum genome architecture at high resolution with Micro-C here:

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

Supported by @erc.europa.eu @pasteur.fr @agencerecherche.bsky.social

How does the malaria parasite regulate co-expression of genes? By recruiting them into transcription factories, courtesy of MORC et al. A fantastic team effort led by @jessmbryant.bsky.social with Jacques Serizay @singh-parul.bsky.social, @ju-couble.bsky.social @rkoszul.bsky.social

An atypical Arp2/3 complex is required for Plasmodium DNA segregation and malaria transmission - Nature Microbiology A unique Arp2/3 complex in malaria parasites enables DNA segregation during the rapid formation of male gametes by safeguarding the attachment of chromosomes to the mitotic spindle.

Awesome malaria study out now in Nature Microbiology:

An atypical Arp2/3 complex is required for Plasmodium DNA segregation and malaria transmission

By Franziska Hentzschel, Matthias Marti, Freddy Frischknecht & colleagues!

@freddyfrischknecht.bsky.social

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

📢 Big Announcement: Registration & abstract submission open for EMBO Workshop "Host-Parasite Relationship: From Mechanisms to Control Strategies" organized by ParaFrap @parafrap.bsky.social @embo.org

🗓️ 5-8 Oct 2025 - Les Embiez Island-France

🔚Deadline: 15 Jul 2025 meetings.embo.org/event/25-hos...

Special shout-out to the presentations from our very own Selina Mussgnung and @thebeilab.bsky.social from the Institut Pasteur network in Dakar!

As usual, fantastic science at #EMBLMalaria. Special thanks for the travel support from @pasteur.fr in the new EMBL-Pasteur initiative and the organization @lilianamancio.bsky.social @sturalph.bsky.social @events.embl.org

scRNA-seq reveals transcriptional plasticity of var gene expression in Plasmodium falciparum for host immune avoidance Nature Microbiology - Single-cell transcriptomics revealed that malaria parasites have unexpected flexibility in surface antigen expression, potentially providing parasites with greater adaptive...

Very happy to congratulate @fra-florini.bsky.social and Joe Visone for the publication of their recent work on antigenic variation by malaria parasites: rdcu.be/emjbn and an earlier version here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1.... Francesca will present some of this work next week at BioMalPar 2025.

Parasites need mitochondrial respiration to infect and spread. Effective anti-malaria and ani-toxoplasmosis drugs target respiratory complexes (e.g. atovaquone)!

But how do the parasite complexes work and how do drugs inhibit them?

Read Andrew Maclean and Alex Mühleip phenomenal work on this! 👇

The KnuepferLab is hiring!

Our team is looking for a highly motivated, experienced molecular parasitologist to expand our group as a postdoctoral researcher at the RVC.

Follow either link below for more information on the project and the job offer:
lnkd.in/eprgmaE9
www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DMY962/p...

Invitiation to attend "Prioritising in a crisis: What next for malaria research?" Friday 25th April 12.30 BST https://www.lshtm.ac.uk/newsevents/events/prioritising-crisis-what-next-malaria-research

Looking forward to joining @lshtm-malaria.bsky.social’s #WorldMalariaDay event to reflect on what’s next for malaria research and how we can continue to drive change.
Details here www.lshtm.ac.uk/newsevents/e... | LSHTM
#Malaria #GlobalHealth #WorldMalariaDay

@erc.europa.eu @pasteur.fr

N6-methyladenosine primes the malaria parasite for transmission Sudden environmental changes are a recurring challenge for unicellular organisms, but a necessity for many to progress through their lifecycle. To transmit from its human host to mosquito vector, mala...

Ready for the most beautifully sophisticated m6A modification program out there?

It’s sex-specific, controls a developmental transition and is temperature-sensitive. Dream team led by Selina, with @ameyasinha.bsky.social @jessmbryant.bsky.social @tizvignolini.bsky.social @ju-couble.bsky.social

The first joint labretreat with @anarbgomes.bsky.social, @jessmbryant.bsky.social and @amtalman.bsky.social is in the books. Thank you so much for hosting us, great science and fun.
@ecoliswatchingu.cpesr.fr @tizvignolini.bsky.social
@pasteur.fr @ird-fr.bsky.social @umontpellier.bsky.social

From Data to Insight – A Practical Introduction to Interpreting Malaria Genetics for Surveillance, a free, self-paced online course offered by the PlasmoGenEpi network and developed with funding from the Gates Foundation.
🔗plasmogenepi.org/OnlineCourse

And with a lot of new approaches for the parasite as well…. protein-DNA proximity labelling, quantitative ChIP-seq, microC, ….

Malaria parasites are an extreme example of ribosome heterogeneity. But how do they control which ribosomal RNA to express when?

Check out this mountain of work led by @ju-couble.bsky.social with @tizvignolini.bsky.social @jessmbryant.bsky.social

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

The VEuPathDB survey asked users to estimate the impact on their lab's productivity (from 0-100) if VEuPathDB resources were to disappear altogether. We also asked them to describe the impact. ✏️The infographic lists a few key themes that emerged from nearly 1500 comments!

📅 Save the Date! The EMBO Workshop "Host-Parasite Relationship: From Mechanisms to Control Strategies" organized by @ParaFrap will take place on October 5-8, 2025, at Les Embiez Island. Stay updated on registration opening —enter your email here: coming-soon.embo.org/w25-83 #Science #Parasite

Plasmodium blood stage development requires the chromatin remodeller Snf2L - Nature Plasmodium falciparum Snf2L is an ISWI-related ATPase that actively repositions P. falciparum nucleosomes in vivo.

Happy to share this with you!
Together with the Längst lab (Uni Regensburg) we characterized PfSnf2L as essential regulator for „just in time“ transcription.
A big thanks to our collaboration partners (Marti lab) and Llinas lab (@llinaslab.bsky.social).

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