Marina Lusic

Sometimes I think about how from 1935-1975ish, Bell Labs produced an insane amount of revolutionary science and technology, including 11 Nobel Prizes, the transistor, UNIX, C, the laser, the solar cell, information theory, etc. The secret? Provide scientists with ample, steady, no-strings funding.

🚀We’re hiring! Join our international team at @ciid-heidelberg.bsky.social and @uniheidelberg.bsky.social
as a PhD Student or Postdoctoral Researcher to lead cutting edge research projects at the virus-host interface

Postdoc: tinyurl.com/d5sdhbnp

PhD: tinyurl.com/bdz5e5u6

Jane Goodall, legendary primatologist, has died at age 91 Jane Goodall, primatologist who transformed our understanding of the lives of apes, has died, according to an announcement from the Jane Goodall Institute.

JUST IN: Jane Goodall, primatologist who transformed our understanding of the lives of apes, has died, according to an announcement from the Jane Goodall Institute.

In 1668, Francesco Redi challenged the idea of spontaneous generation by proving that maggots came from fly eggs, not from rotting meat. His experiment laid the foundation for modern microbiology and disproved centuries of misconceptions about life’s origins. #ScienceHistory

Nucleosome phasing by chromatin remodelers regulates macrophage lineage fidelity by preserving nucleosome arrays flanking PU.1-bound sites to prevent lineage-inappropriate transcription by C/EBPβ @cp-immunity.bsky.social www.cell.com/immunity/ful...

about the $100K H1B fee, here's some interesting details: "If an employee is in the U.S., he or she will not be subject if (i) applying to extend or amend H-1B status, or (ii) applying to change from another visa category into H-1B status from within the U.S."

World's first AI-designed viruses a step towards AI-generated life Scientists used AI to write coherent viral genomes, using them to synthesize bacteriophages capable of killing resistant strains of bacteria.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Do you think this is a matter of progress or concern?

Epigenetics: History, Molecules, and Diseases Buy Epigenetics: History, Molecules, and Diseases on Amazon.com ✓ FREE SHIPPING on qualified orders

1/ One of the questions I get asked about my book is what new they'll discover about #epigenetics.

I hope there will be a lot to learn, but maybe one of the most intriguing stories will be about the contribution of John Pugh.

www.amazon.com/Epigenetics-...

@kazu_maeshima from the Genome Dynamics Laboratory at the National Institute of Genetics (@NIG_idenken) will present groundbreaking research on chromatin organization and behavior in live cells revealed by super-resolution imaging. nyulangone.zoom.us/webinar/regi... #chromatin2025

Speaker Spotlight: Don’t miss @Anders_S_Hansen from MIT as he unpacks the secrets of distal gene regulation in space and time! Learn how enhancers find and activate their target genes—revealing new insights into the selectivity and dynamics of gene control. Reserve your seat:

Antiscience Is an Existential Threat The ideologically-motivated assault on science threatens us all.

“Antiscience has gone beyond U.S. borders to Europe, Australia, and Africa. Defeating it will require unprecedented commitment and international cooperation, not only between scientific organizations, but also their host governments.”
🧪 #Disinformation #AntiScience
time.com/7317436/scie...

Liquid-liquid phase separation of HP1? Not in our mouse fibroblasts… This paper by the Fabian Erdel group offers a fresh perspective on how this can be reconciled with seemingly conflicting reports: The phase separation propensity of HP1 decreases from yeast → fly → mouse. doi.org/10.1038/s414...

How HIV enters the genome – Researchers identify previously unknown mechanism | German Center for Infection Research Researchers at the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF) at Heidelberg University Hospital have decoded a previously unknown mechanism by which

🧬DZIF researchers have discovered that #HIV does not randomly integrate into the genome: the virus follows R-loops as signposts, with the enzyme Aquarius enabling the process. These findings open new avenues for potentially curative treatments.

@marinalusic.bsky.social @natmicrobiol.nature.com

How HIV enters the genome – Researchers identify previously unknown mechanism | German Center for Infection Research Researchers at the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF) at Heidelberg University Hospital have decoded a previously unknown mechanism by which

www.dzif.de/en/how-hiv-e...
@dzif.bsky.social @dfg.de @natmicrobiol.nature.com #HIV #HIVScience #HIVCure #Nucleus #Nucleararchitecture #Splicing #R-loops #Genomeorganization

Lipid Nanoparticles with Aptamers Enable Targeted mRNA Delivery to CD4⁺ T Cells @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Stellar!!!

Remembering David Baltimore, a titan who transformed biology and spoke bluntly The influential Nobel laureate ran institutions, trained future scientific leaders, survived a scandal, and shaped policy

I love his comment on productive careers being unpredictable - and how he was never consciously directing himself anywhere, he was just following his nose

www.science.org/content/arti...

🎵WHY DO ENHANCER!
SUDDENLY APPEAR!
EVERY TIME!
THEY ARE NEAR!?!
JUST LIKE ME!
THEY LONG TO BE!
CLOSE TO POLII! 🎵
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Ahaha that is great!! Love it and will sing this forever!!!!

"I think each virus is its own set of surprises."
- David Baltimore. RIP.

David Baltimore passed away yesterday, “a Nobel Prize-winning biologist whose work…profoundly shaped modern molecular biology &immunology. His discoveries…altered our understanding of viruses &immune responses, laying the foundation for advancements in gene therapy, cancer research, &vaccine devt”🧪🛟

David Baltimore, Nobel-Winning Molecular Biologist, Dies at 87

Sad to hear about the passing of David Baltimore

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/07/s...

Hope for diabetes: CRISPR-edited cells pump out insulin in a person – and evade immune detection Edits create cells that don’t trigger an immune response, allowing implant recipient to forego immune-suppressing drugs.

Researchers implanted CRISPR-edited pancreas cells into a person with type-1 diabetes.

The cells produced insulin for months

There was no need for immune-dampening drugs, due to gene edits that allowed the cells to evade detection by the recipient’s immune system.

🧪
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

A defined microbial community reproduces attributes of fine flavour chocolate fermentation - Nature Microbiology An in-depth microbiological and metagenomic analysis of Colombian farm and fermentation facilities resulted in the design of a defined microbial community that can reproduce the flavour of fine chocol...

Out now!

🍫🦠A defined microbial community reproduces attributes of fine flavour #chocolate fermentation

By Gabriel Castrillo, David Salt & co

#microsky #microbiomesky 🧪

Read it here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Why chocolate tastes so good: microbes that fine-tune its flavour Manipulating the microbial communities involved in cocoa-bean fermentation could make chocolate even more delicious.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Mind-blowing. "To our knowledge, females needing to clone members of another species have not previously been observed"

Belated congrats Abby! Great to see this inspiring story in the final published form!

Final call to register and submit abstracts for the @faseborg.bsky.social conference on the Mechanobiology of the Cell Nucleus (#MBNSRC) to be considered for platform presentations. The conference takes place in Melbourne, FL, Oct. 26-30, 2025. See more info at: events.faseb.org/event/Mechan...

Our new preprint 🧬🔗 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
BRD4-NUT forms liquid-like condensates that locally constrain nucleosomes via BRD4-mediated crosslinking— physical control of #chromatin by #LLPS transcription condensates. @semeigazin.bsky.social @katsuminami.bsky.social @masaashimazoe.bsky.social

Is euchromatin really “open”? Our new study @bioRxiv suggests otherwise. Using super-resolution imaging @shiori-iida.bsky.social‬ @masaashimazoe.bsky.social reveals: Euchromatin forms condensed domains in live cells. Cohesin constrains them and prevents domain mixing.
www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...