Enrique Ortega-Forte

mitochondria from bipolar patients are closer to the nucleus in these images; control patients' are spread out further

15 years in the making, we confirmed that mitochondria - the powerhouse of the cell - have an unusual localization in patients who experience psychosis (including schizophrenia and bipolar disorders). You’ll never guess what kind of patient cells we used to make this discovery… 🧵

Un-frigging-believable. I have waited for something like this for so long!

Mario Ledesma-Terrón, Diego Pérez-Dones, David Míguez and colleagues @cbm-csic-uam.bsky.social @ifimacuam.bsky.social present OSCAR, a framework to quantify 3D stacks with high cellular density.
journals.biologists.com/jcs/article-...

Very exciting work. Shows how interfering with the levels of one lipid class leads to changes of other lipids that are not directly metabolically connected as the cell tries to maintain both lipid flux balance and biophysical membrane properties.

Cholesterol desensitizes the response of endometrial cancer to progestin by attenuating progestin signaling Cholesterol attenuates progesterone signaling through competitive binding of progesterone receptors.

New #ScienceTranslationalMedicine research reveals that cholesterol can disrupt signaling of the fertility-preserving medication progestin in endometrial cancer, and shows that an approved statin can restore progestin sensitivity in mice and a small patient group. https://scim.ag/3IFlwtq

Chimpanzees use the same plants we do to treat similar illnesses A new review of recent studies shows the great apes rely on medicinal plants to heal infections, but the plants’ chemistry remains mostly a mystery

Primatologist Jane Goodall's recent passing left an incredible legacy that transformed our understanding of chimpanzee behavior and intelligence. New insights show that great apes use medicinal plants to treat wounds like humans. cen.acs.org/pharmaceutic... #chemsky 🧪

The bridge-like lipid transport protein VPS13C/PARK23 mediates ER–lysosome contacts following lysosome damage Nature Cell Biology - Wang et al. show the recruitment of the lipid channel protein VPS13C and formation of VPS13C-dependent contacts between endoplasmic reticulum and lysosomes after lysosomal...

"The bridge-like lipid transport protein VPS13C/PARK23 mediates ER–lysosome contacts following lysosome damage" out now in Nature Cell Biology
rdcu.be/ehbaL

Impaired hematopoiesis and embryonic lethality at midgestation of mice lacking both lipid transfer proteins VPS13A and VPS13C VPS13A and VPS13C are bridge-like lipid transport proteins with distinct subcellular localization and function, and their absence is linked with chorea-acanthocytosis and Parkinson's disease, respecti...

"Impaired hematopoiesis and embryonic lethality at midgestation of mice lacking both lipid transfer proteins VPS13A and VPS13C" out now in PLOS Biology
journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

Wonderful to see our paper on the #organelle signatures of #neurons and #astrocytes out in final form - congratulations, Shannon Rhoads and team!🎉 t.co/BPxKlbU6Ou

🚀 Our new paper is out @natmethods.nature.com!

Kuffer & Marzilli engineered conditionally stable MS2 & PP7 coat proteins (dMCP & dPCP) that degrade unless bound to RNA, enabling ultra–low-background, single-mRNA imaging in live cells.

🔗 www.nature.com/articles/s41...
🧬 www.addgene.org/John_Ngo/

Leaflet-specific phospholipid imaging using genetically encoded proximity sensors - Nature Chemical Biology An approach combining bioorthogonal chemistry with genetically encoded fluorogen-activating proteins enables subcellular imaging of phospholipids and glycans, as well as the visualization of lipid tra...

Very excited to share new work out today in @natchembio.nature.com on a new approach - FACES - for selectively imaging of phospholipids and other biomolecules at spatial resolutions down to individual membrane leaflets (1/n) www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Just out of the oven

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

I’m so excited! Stay tuned for more posts about it and give it a read when you can🥰

Quantitative imaging of lipid transport in mammalian cells - Nature Directional, non-vesicular lipid transport is responsible for fast, species-selective lipid sorting into organelle membranes.

This is awesome! Lipid probes for quantitative imaging of lipid transport. A real need in the lipid field!

@nadlerlab.bsky.social

Out today in @nature.com: Together with the Honigmann, Shevchenko, Drobot and Hof labs, we present a general workflow for imaging the localization and transport of individual lipids in cells and mapping their metabolism.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Fantastic work by @nadlerlab.bsky.social and colleagues. A must read for all those interested in lipids and imaging!

Congrats Kirill!

Congrats to @kirillkuznetsov.bsky.social for his article just accepted in @chemicalscience.rsc.org on the (photo-)toxicity of some photocages, which were found to be far from being inert carriers. Wonderful collaboration with @arthurhwinter.bsky.social
@cariouk.bsky.social
doi.org/10.1039/D5SC...

A marker for sterol-dependent metastatic tropism Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, Published online: 11 July 2025; doi:10.1038/s41594-025-01626-1How metabolic fitness in cancer clones is established and selected during dissemination and colonization remains enigmatic. A study in Nature now shows that disseminated pancreatic cancer cells bifurcate to seed the lung or liver on the basis of PCSK9 levels and the availability of microenvironmental cholesterol.

ICYMI: New online: A marker for sterol-dependent metastatic tropism

ROS transfer at peroxisome-mitochondria contact regulates mitochondrial redox Maintenance of mitochondrial redox homeostasis is of fundamental importance to cellular health. Mitochondria harbor a host of intrinsic antioxidant defenses, but the contribution of extrinsic, nonmito...

ROS transfer at peroxisome-mitochondria contact regulates mitochondrial redox www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

🚨 We are looking for highly motivated postdocs to apply for a MSCA in our group at Universitat de Barcelona! @ub.edu
Join us to develop light-activated drugs for photodynamic therapy & bioimaging 🔬💡
👉 Apply before July 9th!
📧 vmarchan@ub.edu | agandioso@ub.edu
🔗 More info below
#PostdocPosition

A biocompatible Lossen rearrangement in Escherichia coli - Nature Chemistry Biocompatible chemistry merges chemo-catalytic reactions with cellular metabolism for sustainable small-molecule synthesis. Now a biocompatible Lossen rearrangement has been demonstrated to control ba...

Wow: Plastic → Tylenol? 🧪♻️💊

A biocompatible Lossen rearrangement—a reaction never seen in nature—occurring INSIDE E. coli

Bacteria engineered to convert PET plastic → Tylenol in <24h, with 92% yield + low emissions

Stunning blend of chemistry and synthetic biology

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

A checklist for designing and improving the visualization of scientific data Nature Cell Biology - Creating clear and engaging scientific figures is crucial to communicate complex data. In this Comment, I condense principles from design, visual perception and data...

I gave in! After students asking for it, I now made a simple figure design checklist.
To help all scientists w/o graphic skills create clear, accessible, and truthful charts!
-> Out in @nature Cell Biology: rdcu.be/erwl4

#DataVisualization #PhD #SciComm

Thx for review @bethcimini.bsky.social + 2

DNA-guided transcription factor interactions extend human gene regulatory code - Nature A large-scale analysis of DNA-bound transcription factors (TFs) shows how the presence of DNA markedly affects the landscape of TF interactions, and identifies composite motifs that are recognized by ...

It's an interesting phenomenon that some of the deepest questions about how life works have become what looks like impossibly obscure molecular biology stuck right at the back of Nature, which will never get covered by the science media. Like this. /1
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Online today in @nature.com - our latest study led by superstar postdoc Gilles Rademaker detailing the role of PSCK9 in driving sterol dependent metastatic organ choice in pancreatic cancer nature.com/articles/s41...
full text available here 👉 rdcu.be/em0VG and thread 👇

Plasma membrane labelling efficiency, internalization and partitioning of functionalized fluorescent lipids as a function of lipid structure Labeling the plasma membrane for advanced imaging remains a significant challenge. For time-lapse live cell imaging, probe internalization and photobleaching are major limitations affecting most membr...

New paper out! Would you like to fluorescently label the plasma membrane in live, fixed or permeabilized cells? I tested different lipid structures and labelling approaches to decide what makes a good membrane labelling probe for such imaging experiments!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Why are biological membranes asymmetric, with different lipids in the two bilayer leaflets? Discovered in the 70s, lipid asymmetry is linked to many cellular processes, but why the cell needs it is largely unclear. @pavelbarahtjan.bsky.social addresses this question: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Achieving red-light anticancer photodynamic therapy under hypoxia using Ir(III)–COUPY conjugates Despite the potential of photodynamic therapy (PDT), this oxygen-dependent oncological treatment is greatly restricted in the clinic by the well-known hypoxic feature of solid tumors. Here we provide ...

📢Issue 09 of Inorganic Chemistry Frontiers is online!

👇Check out the outside front cover and the research behind the cover art——Achieving red-light #anticancer #photodynamic therapy under hypoxia using Ir(iii)–COUPY conjugates @eortegaforte.bsky.social
doi.org/10.1039/D4QI...
#Chemsky #ICF_cover

Lipid-degrading small molecule kills cancer cells by ferroptosis A molecule designed to activate iron locked up in organelles called lysosomes and thereby induce cell death might offer a way to tackle treatment-resistant cancer.

Fantastic new study from Raphael Rodriguez' lab shows that induced proximity concepts can be used to induce Ferroptosis! Inducing proximity of lysosomal iron and lipids induces lipid peroxidation! What a cool concept! Have a look at our News/Views with @olzmannlab.bsky.social shorturl.at/cbc8D

I made a little browser extension for Firefox that simplifies the sharing of preprints from @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social and @medrxivpreprint.bsky.social on Bluesky:

Looks amazing —congratulations on the stunning cover art!