Florian Wollweber

Check out our new preprint on the discovery of a molecular switch in NAC that mediates nascent chain sorting on the ribosome and prevents mitochondrial protein mistargeting by SRP. A great collaboration with the Shan Lab @Caltech and the Qi Lab @UVA: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Exciting Aug 1️⃣ for two incredible people- Gregor Weiss and Jingwei Xu! Both are starting their independent labs 🔬🧪 TODAY 🥳
I am incredibly thankful 🙏 for their contributions to the lab and that I could be part of their journey
-Martin
@xujwet.bsky.social
@weiss-lab.bsky.social
It was a wild ride👇

An Asgard archaeon from a modern analog of ancient microbial mats It has been proposed that eukaryotic cells evolved via symbiosis between sulfate-reducing bacteria and hydrogen-producing archaea. Here we describe a highly enriched culture of a novel Asgard archaeon...

📣 New paper alert!
One of the most exciting projects we've done in recent years is now out on BioRxiv: "An Asgard archaeon from a modern analog of ancient microbial mats".

Glimpse into early complex life! ❄️🦠 🔬🧬

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1.... A thread...

Group Leader - Genome Biology Unit Are you ready to lead groundbreaking research in Genome Biology? Join us at EMBL! We are seeking a motivated scientist to lead an independent research group addressing exciting and original biological...

To all post-docs: The Genome Biology dept ‪@embl.org
has an Independent faculty position. Fantastic place to set up your lab –great package: core funding, fantastic Ph.D. students, cutting edge core facilities & great colleagues. Closing date Sept 19th
embl.wd103.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/EMBL/j...

Very excited to announce that my first, first author paper, is now on BioRxiv! In this paper we unambiguously show #COPII coated vesicles in unperturbed human cells for the very first time!!

Make my day and check it out!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

#Cryo-ET #TeamTomo #Cryo-CLEM ❄️🔬❄️🔬❄️🔬❄️🔬

Group Leader – Molecular Systems Biology Unit Are you ready to lead groundbreaking research in Molecular Systems Biology? Join us at EMBL! We are seeking a motivated scientist to lead an independent research group, addressing original biological ...

Ready to lead pioneering research that bridges systems-level investigations of biological systems to molecular mechanism? The EMBL Molecular Systems Biology Unit in Heidelberg is hiring a Group Leader!

New preprint: In situ Architecture of #Plasmodesmata.

Using #cryoET, #AlphaFold & proteomics, we uncover the native organization of plant intercellular nanopores.

🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...

🧪🧵1/n
#teamtomo #PlantScience #Physcomitrium #Arabidopsis #cryoEM

📢 Excited to share our new study in Nature Communications!
We show that the A-C linker safeguards centriole architecture & controls duplication. A big congratulations to Lorène for this beautiful discovery, which represents 4 years of her thesis work.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

I am super excited to announce that I will be starting my lab at the Department of Pharmacology of the University of Zurich in Switzerland next year!

Happy to share the latest work from the lab, led by @mudgal17.bsky.social‬, in collaboration with the Weis lab @ethzurich.bsky.social.
How do nuclear membranes fuse during NPC assembly? We answer this question in our latest work, where we identify a new mechanism for membrane fusion… (1/13)

Grateful to the Boehringer Ingelheim Stiftung for their renewed support. Their commitment empowers us to further advance our mission: enabling broad access to state-of-the-art imaging technologies for the scientific community

🚨 New EMBO Practical Course!
Ultrastructure Expansion Microscopy: From Cells to Tissue 🔬
📅 20–24 Apr 2026 | 📍 EMBL Heidelberg
Co-organised with @banterlegroup.bsky.social @gautamdey.bsky.social

💡 Register your interest to get notified when registration opens:

🔗 www.embl.org/about/info/c...

A cartoon depiction of the Asgard archaeon Skadiarchaeum sp., named after the Norse goddess of skiing and hunting, Skadi.

In a couple of days, my grad student Stavros Trimmer will present his new Asgard archaea culture at the GRC Archaea. He named it Skadiarchaeum after Skadi, the Norse goddess of skiing and hunting. Cartoon of Skadi based on cryoET, which was performed together with with @florianwollweber.bsky.social

A stylized image of the molecular model of a mitochondrial crista, with proteins and lipids shown

What better way to use my first proper post than to share my first big piece of post-doctoral work with @cg-martini.bsky.social!
Here, we used integrative modelling to build and simulate a mitochondrial cristae.
Find the paper here (rdcu.be/eujAC) or see below for a quick overview 👇

Function and firing of the Streptomyces coelicolor contractile injection system requires the membrane protein CisA CryoEM, genetic, and cell biological analyses reveal that the conserved membrane protein CisA mediates membrane recruitment of contractile injection systems Streptomyces coelicolor, enabling their act...

Happy to see our collaborative work on the contractile injection system (CIS) in Streptomyces published. We show that the membrane protein CisA gives Streptomyces CIS a licence to kill.
@pilhoferlab.bsky.social & Bastien Casu, @joesallmen.bsky.social #MicroSky

elifesciences.org/articles/104...

A practical look at cryo-electron tomography image processing: Key considerations for new biological discoveries Cryo-electron tomography (cryo-ET) enables 3D visualization of complex biological environments without the need for purification, thereby preserving t…

Happy to say that my Current Opinion in Structural Biology article came out today. I hope it helps to guide to you in using cryo-ET to make new biological discoveries!

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

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.

Come and Join our Dpt in Beautiful #Geneva !

We are looking for a #Microscopy & #Image #Analysis expert to help all of us at the Dpt.

new preprint alert from the lab: bringing some order into the wide and wild diversity of archaeal histones. Who has acidic histones? who has multiple histones? what histone combinations do archaea employ and why? find all of this and more here
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Evolutionary repurposing of a DNA segregation machinery into a cytoskeletal system controlling cyanobacterial cell shape Bacteria, despite their diversity, use conserved cytoskeletal systems for their intracellular organization. In unicellular bacteria, the ParMRC DNA partitioning apparatus is well known for forming act...

One of the most exciting discoveries from our lab so far is now online as a preprint!

Read a story on how the ParMR and Min systems started to collaborate to create the CorMR cytoskeleton, which now controls cell shape in multicellular cyanobacteria:
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Thank you!!

Thanks Daniel!

Thank you Flora!! Looking forward! Would be great to image some diatoms :)

Thank you Roland!

Thanks Omaya! Yes, you have to visit!

Merci!

Thank you Eva!

After 5 amazing years @pilhoferlab.bsky.social I'm starting my lab @embl.org Grenoble this November embl.org/wollweber
We'll image Asgard archaea and many other strange microbes ( #archaeasky, #protistsonsky..) to understand eukaryogenesis
First job ad: #teamtomo scientist!🔬❄️ tinyurl.com/2rdu2ze6

List of 30 CloneFISH cultures available for free (requester is asked to pay shipping fees).

Manuscript/resource alert #microsky 🦠 My lab offers the community a collection of 30 E. coli (CloneFISH) cultures, each carrying a plasmid for the heterologous expression of a (near) full-length 16S rRNA gene from one of 30 lineages of archaea, including 19 yet uncultured ones.

Excited to share our new paper in @cellreports.bsky.social that reshapes our understanding of chromosome organization's deep evolutionary roots! Our work dives into the origins of the machinery that structures our very genomes.

🔗: doi.org/10.1016/j.ce...

#Genomics #Evolution #CellBiology #LECA