Maayan Visuals

Congratulations to Victor A. S. Jones, Megan Ferguson and Annika Guse and their co-authors!
This was a very fun piece to work on, and a fascinating topic. #coralreefs #coverart #marinebiology #coralbleaching #symbiont #scienceillustration

Integrins mediate symbiont-specific uptake in cnidarian larvae - EMBO Reports Endosymbiosis between dinoflagellate algae and cnidaria is fundamental for coral reef health. Appropriate symbiont selection is required for sufficient host nutrient acquisition and could be tailored ...

Appropriate symbiont selection is required for sufficient host nutrient acquisition and could even be tailored to increase cnidarian stress tolerance. The research here reveals integrins as important receptors for symbiosis establishment
Read more here:
link.springer.com/article/10.1...

First cover of 2026 is out!
How do symbiotic organisms like corals and cnidarians identify their symbionts as such, rather than as debris/food/ etc?
#SciArt ...

Visual communication for scientists resources- Updated!! I am currently offering lectures and workshops focused on Visual Communication for Scientists- online and in person! I ran a quick Twitter poll and it seems that this kind of training is badly needed....

Thanks to everyone who participated and I have a blog post here with lots of resources that can help with scientific figure design, posters, grant figures, and data visualization!

#SciArt #Academia #sciencepublishing #journalcovers #academics #phd #gradschool
www.maayanvisuals.com/post/visual-...

It's really exciting to me to see how the institute is giving better tools to its trainees to achieve publication-level graphics and beyond. I'm hoping to have lots more of these types of sessions!

A couple of weeks ago I got the chance to speak to graduate students, post-docs and PIs at the @weizmanninstitute.bsky.social about how to use visual tools to communicate their science more effectively. This was part of a course in Adobe Illustrator given at the department of Life Sciences...

This has been an interesting year, one with lots of opportunities to create!
I am so grateful for all of my clients and collaborators.
Let's bring on a new year of creativity, peace, love and family
#SciArt #academia #coverart

#artvartist #artvartist2025

This has been an interesting year, one with lots of opportunities to create!
I am so grateful for all of my clients and collaborators.
Let's bring on a new year of creativity, peace, love and family
#SciArt #academia #coverart

Frontiers | Protein quality control systems in neurodegeneration – culprits, mitigators, and solutions? A key hallmark of neurodegenerative diseases (NDDs) is the formation of neurotoxic protein aggregates, which are considered to reflect inadequate protein qua...

Read about it here: www.frontiersin.org/journals/neu...

Disruptions to protein quality control + degradation processes (UPS, autophagy) lead to protein aggregates. These aggregates are toxic to cells and interfere with key processes like proteostasis, cell structure and organelle function, molecule trafficking, and oxidative stress and inflammation.

I'm excited to share this piece of work on #neurodegeneration by the Ciechanover lab @technion.bsky.social and Rambam Health Care Campus. I was thrilled to work on these graphics #SciArt #biology #Neurodegenerativediseases

In the spirit of giving thanks, here are a few things I am grateful for today:
1. Our body’s incredible immune system, and the tireless work of scientists to enhance immunotherapy, using CD8+ T cells that can infiltrate cancer...
#immunotherapy #cancerresearch #SciArt #coverart

Tricks and Treats - AI art #SciArt
I often get asked how I made a particular piece of artwork (here it's @procreate.com ). I am always happy to share, and the answer you *will not* hear is generative AI.
The idea of AI image generation as a magic trick is deceptive...

CRATERs on Cover! Thanks @cp-cell.bsky.social for choosing our study for the cover of the Nov 26th issue! A beautiful illustration by @maayanvisuals.bsky.social and @mgarbelli.bsky.social depicting CD8+ T cells descend into CRATERs on a melanoma, where they will engage with the tumor and kill it.

lnkd.in/egvERKhv
Image source: Maayan Harel and Marco Garbelli for Maayan Visuals

Congratulations to Leonard Zon, @ayaludin.bsky.social and their collaborators at @hhmi.org, @bostonchildrens.bsky.social, and @harvard.edu
for this awesome work!

3. A new cover- out just in time for Thanksgiving :)

This piece is a collaboration between the wonderful @mgarbelli.bsky.social and myself, using a mixture of hand-sculpted T Cells, and digital painting a to show how T Cells are able to make CRATERs in melanoma tumors.

2. The chance to collaborate with amazing scientists and wonderful artists to bring visual expression to cutting-edge research
and…

In the spirit of giving thanks, here are a few things I am grateful for today:
1. Our body’s incredible immune system, and the tireless work of scientists to enhance immunotherapy, using CD8+ T cells that can infiltrate cancer...
#immunotherapy #cancerresearch #SciArt #coverart

Happy Halloween ! my thoughts on AI slop

But these tricks are in fact tools in the toolbox of a well-trained artist. And when you hire one, the art you can collaborate on will be the real treat. #AI #generativeAI #ArtistsagainstAI #HappyHalloween

Real art is also full of tricks- this is true of both digital and traditional media. There are tricks to lighting your image, there are tricks to make something look 3D, iridescent, or ethereal, or humorous. There are tricks to developing a good concept for an illustration....

It has no ability to edit, no understanding of its creation, and no training that is not the result of theft. The “treats” it so easily spits out (at huge environmental cost) are so cheap, they are in fact a trick. They trick the prompter into thinking they are an artist.

Tricks and Treats - AI art #SciArt
I often get asked how I made a particular piece of artwork (here it's @procreate.com ). I am always happy to share, and the answer you *will not* hear is generative AI.
The idea of AI image generation as a magic trick is deceptive...

YouTube video by NewsAtIllinois Atomic Stencil for Patchy Nanoparticles

They made a great video describing the technique here:
youtu.be/82M2sMzv52A?...

This is an incredibly cool approach for creating unique nanoparticles, drawing upon classical techniques of masking + stenciling on pottery.
My illustration drew inspiration from Ernst #Haeckel's famous plates and geometry
news.illinois.edu/atom-scale-s...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

I usually work on art inspired by science, but this time around the science was inspired by art!
Congratulations to Ahyoung Kim and Qian Chen and colleagues for their work on atom-scale stenciling!

#SciArt #art #pottery #nanotechnology #nanoparticles

Asking BlueSky for help: For a review, I am trying to accurately credit the first paper that measured pairwise 3D distances between 2 pieces of DNA on the same chromosome (or cosmid). Is Trask 1989 the first?
I know of earlier single-locus papers (1982).
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Hunting for #denisovans in the fossil record is leading to new discoverie! #sciart #paleoanthropology