Caitie McCafferty

Latest from ours: www.cell.com/cell-reports...

This is two stories in one: a case study/cautionary tale on developing genetic tools in new organisms, and the first hint at a gene regulatory network for choanoflagellate multicellular development (which turn out to involve a Hippo/YAP/ECM loop!) A 🧵

So much fun to host @edwardmarcotte.bsky.social at the @biozentrum.unibas.ch and introduce him to the @cellarchlab.com, thanks for a wonderful Discovery Seminar!!

Assistant/Associate Professor in Structural Biology, Biophysics or Biological Imaging

www.biozentrum.unibas.ch/open-positio...

#biozentrum #University #Basel #Professor #Structural #Biology #Biophysics #Biological #Imaging

You don’t want to miss this one!

Meet the CAGE: a newly-discovered protein nanocapsule💊, conserved from bacteria to eukaryotes! Looks more like an eclair🍩 than a prezel🥨. This protein pastry now makes us wonder- what's the filling!? Huge congrats to the ever-amazing @computingcaitie.bsky.social, now at the @biozentrum.unibas.ch 🧪🧶🧬

Thanks Oli! And yes the resemblance is uncanny 🔮

Yes it’s a midi shell, I’ll think about how to rephrase/present it better before submitting :)

I am in a cryo-ET lab now so hoping to figure it out!

Next step U-ExM!!

Shout out to the amazing team working on this @ghooger.bsky.social, Ophelia, Evan, Simone, Axel and my PhD advisors David Taylor and @edwardmarcotte.bsky.social for always encouraging me to explore!!!

We have renamed it to CAGE: Conserved Assembly in Gram-negative bacteria and Eukaryotes; because in addition to shape, it has crazy phylogeny!! And to quote the paper: “The CAGE complex stands as both a new structural archetype and a reminder that the molecular universe is far from fully charted.”

When I first saw it in my micrographs, I thought it looked like a Philadelphia pretzel. After years of explaining a Philly pretzel and receiving endless pretzel pictures (s/o Jamie) and pretzel swag (s/o @sofie-dot-rec.bsky.social)….

The early days looking at this complex were spent with @ghooger.bsky.social on the JEOL 2010F in the basement of UT Austin during the pandemic (while watching Real Housewives)

I am excited to share our new preprint on the CAGE complex, a mysterious hollow protein complex that I first saw years ago while surveying Tetrahymena ciliary lysate www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... #cilia #protistsonsky 🧬🧪

A molecular-resolution look into the near-native architecture of the spinach chloroplast🌱. This one was a long time in the oven, but we're happy to finally share our "version of record". What long-standing debates did we settle? Check back for a short thread🧵 on Monday. #TeamTomo #PlantScience 🧪🧶🧬🔬🌾

Side hustle level-up! My book, IN THE BEGINNING, will be published by @harperonebooks.bsky.social in 2027! It's about the human embryo, how it gets built, and what it means for where we come from and where we're going.
@harpercollins.bsky.social (1/2)
@socdevbio.bsky.social
#devbiol
#scicomm

Congrats Maite!

Sub-cellular chemical mapping in bacteria using correlated cryogenic electron and mass spectrometry imaging

Congrats Hannah Ochner and authors on this important paper! Strong collaboration with @kiranrpatil.bsky.social

www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...
@mrclmb.bsky.social @wellcometrust.bsky.social

Trouble imaging actin in ExM? Meet HAK-Actin, a probe for U-ExM, cryo-ExM & iU-ExM. Enables post-expansion labeling for max signal. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Soon at @spirochrome.com
Led by O.Mercey and @lreymond.bsky.social, in collab with @dudinlab.bsky.social and @marinelap.bsky.social

How did life get multicellular? Five simple organisms could have the answer Single-celled species that often stick together in colonies have researchers rethinking the origin of animals.

For some three billion years, unicellular organisms ruled Earth. Then, around one billion years ago, a new chapter of life began

go.nature.com/3JyRV4S

So cool Ben!!

Biozentrum PhD Fellowships Share your passion for life sciences. If you are talented and highly motivated, want to broaden your horizons and are interested in a wide range of research topics, apply for one of the sought after B...

Apply now for the prestigious and independent #BiozentrumPhDFellowships. Great science. Unique rotation-based selection of research group and other incentives. The summer call is open until October 12, 2025. bit.ly/4caiqqX @biozentrum.unibas.ch @unibas.ch #fellowship #PhD#Switzerland

📢 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...

Primary cilia and BBS4 are required for postnatal pituitary development Primary cilia orchestrate several signaling pathways, and their disruption results in pleiotropic disorders called ciliopathies. Bardet Beidl syndrome (BBS), one such ciliopathy, provides insights int...

‼️🚨Preprint alert! 🚨‼️
Excited to have some of my first works as a postdoc, and first corresponding author (!!), on biorxiv! This was a fun side quest of a project marrying a few things I deeply love, development, cilia, and hormones in the pituitary! Happy reading!

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

Such a pleasure to be co-organising the #Latsis Symposium this year with Guillermina !

Thanks to all the speakers & sponsors.

And all our teams members who helped make this a reality.

It just felt right.

#Science #WildCells #ProtistsOnSky #Cell #Biology #Biophysics #Behaviour

Wow! Really nice collaborative work in this piece on RSG1 in human ciliopathy and transition zone assembly

Woo! Very excited to share our collaborative work on the centriole's Luminal Distal Ring ⭕. This project started 13 years ago with @hugovdhoek.bsky.social & @stearnslab.bsky.social, and then beautifully came together with @computingcaitie.bsky.social & @centriolelab.bsky.social.
#TeamTomo #UExM 🧪🧶🧬🔬

Omaya Dudin Interview with Omaya Dudin, who uses Ichthyosporea as models to study how and why unicellular organisms evolved multicellularity at the University of Geneva.

90% of you probably don’t need to read this.
But maybe some of you are curious & 10% will feel seen. Or a little less alone. This isn’t about seeking sympathy.
It’s about sharing something hard to say out loud;
partly to heal, partly in case someone needs to hear it too. (1/3)
tinyurl.com/DudinO

We’re kicking off the DinoSphere Online Seminar Series! Join us for our first session with Karel Mockaer (Heidelberg) & Yong Heng Phua (OIST)

📅 1 July 9AM CEST
🔗 tinyurl.com/4mjaverj

Spread the word!
@protistwtmostest.bsky.social @ehehenberger.bsky.social @chandnibhickta.bsky.social&Norico Yamada

Share with your network, group members, colleagues & friends.

We are extending the deadline till the 10th of June.

This is your last chance of joining us this summer.

#Science #ProtistsOnSky #Cell #Biology #Microscopy