Sebastian Falk

Graphical abstract: The Drosophila OSC Genome as a resource for transposon and piRNA biology. The figure illustrates the workflow and key findings. Left: De novo genome assembly using Oxford Nanopore Technologies (ONT) long reads and Hi-C data generates a phased assembly distinguishing unique (blue) and repetitive (orange) sequences. Dot plot comparison between OSC-r1.01 and dm6 reference genomes shows overall synteny with extensive structural variation. Middle: A freely accessible UCSC genome browser session displays multi-omics data tracks including gene models, transposon insertions, chromatin accessibility, transcription, small RNAs, and histone modifications. Right: New insights into flamenco piRNA cluster biology reveal >730 kb transcribed from a single promoter without major splicing. Tethering assays demonstrate long-range silencing effects across the locus, and genome browser tracks show coordinated regulation of piRNA production, transcription, and chromatin state. This resource enables comprehensive studies of transposon regulation and piRNA pathway function in a widely-used Drosophila cell line.

When transposons jump, genomes diverge - even in cultured cells.
I am happy to share our new preprint: a chromosome-scale genome assembly for Drosophila OSC cells, one of the key model systems in the piRNA field, especially for nuclear piRNA biology. 🧬🧵 (1/12)

Professorship in plant genetics.
The Botanical Institute at Kiel University is advertising a W2 professorship. Great opportunity to do plant research in the north of Germany. See:
www.berufungen.uni-kiel.de/de/dateien/o...

PIWI clade Argonautes are essential for transposon silencing. Without them, animals are sterile due to massive transposon activity.

But how does piRNA-guided target interaction translate into silencing?

PhD student Júlia Portell Montserrat has an intriguing answer

www.cell.com/molecular-ce...

I am excited to announce that I will be moving to IMB Mainz next year! The Winter call for the IPP PhD program is now open; if you are interested in maternal #mRNA regulation and #translation in early vertebrate development, please apply! Deadline: 16 October.

More info: www.imb.de/students-pos...

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

Multi-scale Simulations of MUT-16 Scaffold Protein Phase Separation and Client Recognition Phase separation of proteins plays a critical role in cellular organisation. How phase separated protein condensates underpin biological function and how condensates achieve specificity remain elusive...

🎉 Congrats to @kgaurav.bsky.social, Lukas Stelzl & @reneketting.bsky.social (SFB1551) on their new Biophysical Journal paper! #MUT16 #PhaseSeparation #MutatorFoci #SmallRNA #GeneRegulation #Celegans #ProteinAssembly #RNAResearch #MultiscaleSimulations Great teamwork👏👏👏 www.cell.com/biophysj/ful....

Intracellular pathogen effector reprograms host gene expression by inhibiting mRNA decay - Nature Communications Intracellular pathogens hijack host gene expression to subvert cellular processes. Here, the authors show that Legionella pneumophila’s PieF effector inhibits the human CCR4-NOT deadenylation machiner...

Happy to share the latest work on a bacterial protein that inhibits human mRNA decay machinery, in collaboration with @smlea.bsky.social #RNAsky

www.nature.com/articles/s41... Intracellular pathogen effector reprograms host gene expression by inhibiting mRNA decay | Nature Communications

This guy…..

Full Professorship in Molecular Mechanisms of Disease - Vienna BioCenter, Austria job with Max Perutz Labs, University of Vienna | 12841053 Join theMax Perutz Labs as Full Professor to unravel disease mechanisms—from metabolism and stress to RNA regulation, epigenetics, and immunity.

Exciting and rare opportunity to join the @maxperutzlabs.bsky.social and the @viennabiocenter.bsky.social as a Full Professor!
www.nature.com/naturecareer...

Congratulations Marco and team. Great to see it published 🎉

Sequence-based prediction of intermolecular interactions driven by disordered regions Intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs) in proteins play essential roles in cellular function. A growing body of work has shown that IDRs often interact with partners in a manner that does not depend ...

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

🚀 Group leaders Peter Schlögelhofer, Robert Konrat, and @sebastianfalk.bsky.social have secured @fwf-at.bsky.social projects, bringing in nearly €1.5 million. Their projects span mRNA processing, novel NMR methods, and chromosome architecture ➡️ tinyurl.com/3a6j3pw8

@univie.ac.at
@meduniwien.ac.at

If only funders saw the bigger picture… The obsession with medical research has come at a cost: plant biology has been sidelined, with countless discoveries stalled. Just look at Barbara McClintock, who discovered mobile genetic elements—only to be dismissed at the time of her groundbreaking work.

Reisen mit Deutschen Bahn; immer wieder ein Erlebnis, leider selten ein schoenes. ICE228 von Wien nach Wue; 5 h Fahrt und nur drei funktionierende Toiletten im ganzen Zug. Der Zug ist voll.. mehr als 20 minuten Anstehen fuer menschliche Beduerfnisse. @deutsche-bahn.bsky.social @bahn.bsky.social

Congrats Anton and co. Great stuff.

YouTube video by Johan Gibcus Rules of Engagement

Earnshaw, Goloborodko, Dekker & Mirny labs are excited to present our latest work, "Rules of engagement for condensins and cohesins guide mitotic chromosome formation" - now accepted!!
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
A short clip describing the key results:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmvO...

Traffic Jam activates the Flamenco piRNA cluster locus and the Piwi pathway to ensure transposon silencing and Drosophila fertility Rivera et al. discover Drosophila Flamenco piRNA cluster enhancers bound and activated by the Traffic Jam transcription factor. Traffic Jam also binds many follicle cell genes including activating mul...

Why NIH/NIGMS funding of basic research matters with our latest work now out in @cp-cellreports.bsky.social sky.social. We solved a >30-year-old mystery of what transcription factor drives the Flamenco piRNA cluster required for female Drosophila fertility. /1
www.cell.com/cell-reports...

Assistant Professor (tenure track) – Chromatin, Epigenetics - Vancouver, British Columbia (CA) job with The University of British Columbia (UBC) | 12837841 Assistant Professor (tenure track) - Chromatin Regulation, Genetic Regulatory Mechanisms, Epigenetics, Epigenomics

www.nature.com/naturecareer... UBC LSI Job!!

🚨 Out now! The Leonard lab reveals in @pnas.org that phosphatases PHLPP1/2, once thought to dephosphorylate Akt and suppress tumors, are actually catalytically inactive. Instead, they have a non-catalytic role, reshaping our understanding of Akt regulation ➡️ tinyurl.com/hf28b3mu

@univie.ac.at

Read the Letter Researchers at academic institutions nationwide say that U.S. science is being dismantled.

www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

This is Yale Professor Timothy Snyder, who studies authoritarians and tyranny, with a warning.

He and another Yale professor, Jason Stanley, who studies similar topics at Yale, are moving to Canadian universities, a result of the political and academic climate here.

Our paper on prediction of phase-separation propensities of disordered proteins from sequence is now published:
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

The paper has been substantially updated compared to the preprint including new experimental data and using the neural network to finetune CALVADOS. 1/n

📯📯📯 10 days left to apply for the International Master MemBioMed "From Membrane Biology to Neuroscience & Experimental Medicine". Scholarships available for selected students to acquire intensive training in analysing the complex behavior of biomembranes and exploiting their therapeutic potential 👇👇

UbiREAD deciphers proteasomal degradation code of homotypic and branched K48 and K63 ubiquitin chains Ubiquitin chains determine the fates of their modified proteins, including proteasomal degradation. Kiss et al. present UbiREAD, a technology to monitor cellular degradation and deubiquitination at hi...

Super excited to share our latest work on deciphering the #Ubiquitin Code

“𝗨𝗯𝗶𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗗 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗽𝗵𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝘁𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗼𝗺𝗮𝗹 𝗱𝗲𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗰𝗼𝗱𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗵𝗼𝗺𝗼𝘁𝘆𝗽𝗶𝗰 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗯𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗵𝗲𝗱 𝗞48 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗞63 𝘂𝗯𝗶𝗾𝘂𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗻 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗶𝗻𝘀”

@cp-molcell.bsky.social

1/8

www.cell.com/molecular-ce...

Great talks & discussions at the 76th Mosbacher Kolloquium last week - in particular fantastic Lynen Lecture by Tanja Kortemme @kortemmelab.bsky.social and Eduard-Buchner award lecture by Dorothee Kern! And great to see so many old and new friends. @gbmev.bsky.social

RNA meets protein decay Establishing the composition of RNAs and proteins that defines the identities and functions of cells relies not only on the regulated biosynthesis of these molecules, but also equally importantly, on…

One week left to register and submit abstracts for being considered for talks at our upcoming #EMBO Meeting "RNA Meets Protein Degradation" in Vienna! Check out the program with a fantastic line-up of speakers, including keynotes by Rachel Green and Manu Hedge.
meetings.embo.org/event/25-rna...

Microtubules in Asgard archaea Discovery of heterodimeric, microtubule-forming tubulins in Asgard archaea, the closest known relatives of eukaryotes, reveals snapshots of microtubule evolution.

Microtubules in Asgard archaea @cellpress.bsky.social

@pilhoferlab.bsky.social

www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

🎉 Today, we look back on a milestone moment in Perutz history! On this day in 2005, the rectors of the University of Vienna and the Medical University of Vienna, Georg Winckler and Wolfgang Schütz, signed the notarial deed, officially establishing the Max Perutz Labs. 🧬🎊 #MaxPerutzLabs20Years

A screenshot of two news headlines. The first headline reads: "Britain Issues Travel Warning for US," with a publication date of Mar 20, 2025, at 10:16 AM EDT and an update at 10:53 AM EDT. The second headline reads: "Germany Issues Travel Warning for US," with a publication date of Mar 20, 2025, at 7:49 AM EDT and an update at 12:00 PM EDT. Both headlines are in bold black text, with the publication and update details in smaller red text below.

This is what we’ve come to, and so quickly.

Dringender Appell an die neue Bundesregierung: Saar-Wissenschaftler fordern „klaren Kurs in der Klimapolitik“ Mit einem offenen Brief fordern Wissenschaftler aus ganz Deutschland die neue Bundesregierung auf, Klimapolitik ernst zu nehmen – und sammelten innerhalb weniger Tage mehr als 12 000 Unterschriften vo...

Mit einem offenen Brief fordern Wissenschaftler aus ganz Deutschland die neue Bundesregierung auf, Klimapolitik ernst zu nehmen – und sammelten innerhalb weniger Tage mehr als 12 000 Unterschriften von Kollegen.

www.saarbruecker-zeitung.de/sz-spezial/k...