Hironori Funabiki

Angelika Amon in her laboratory.

Are you a grad student pursuing the life sciences or biomedical research outside the U.S.? Applications now open for the Angelika Amon Young Scientist Award until June 13. Enter to win $1,000 USD & a chance to present your work & network w/ MIT faculty.

buff.ly/F7s94vW

MagIC-Cryo-EM, structural determination on magnetic beads for scarce macromolecules in heterogeneous samples A technique that enables single-particle cryo-EM analysis of targets on a magnetic bead and a particle curation method that helps structural classification of small particles has been developed.

elifesciences.org/articles/103...

The peer-reviewed VOR for the MagIC-cryo-EM paper by @yarimura.bsky.social‬ and @1001hak.bsky.social‬ is finally published!
Congrats Yasu!

Congratulations, Aaron!

A great curiosity-driven research!

The centennial of E.B. Wilson's The Cell in Development and Heredity | Molecular Biology of the Cell We review and salute the third edition of E.B. Wilson's “The Cell in Development and Heredity” published a century ago, noting its unique features and placing them in context. Brief commentaries from ...

"The centennial of E.B. Wilson's The Cell in Development and Heredity" by Maienschein, Chalfie, and Pederson, including reflections by J. R. McIntosh, Matthew Messelson, et al.
www.molbiolcell.org/doi/10.1091/...

In preparation for the lecture tomorrow, I opened "The Cell in Development and Heredity" by E.B. Wilson (Columbia Univ), and realized that this 3rd edition was published in 100 years ago.

So many things happened since then, including the fact that I, a Japanese Prof in NY, own and read the book.

Even "useless" objects can be appreciated - arts are indispensable for human society.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperar...

Biologists know that redundant or non-essential parts often play important roles.

Still, human society must decide on priorities, and this requires justifications.

A historical perspective on the discovery of statins - PubMed Cholesterol is essential for the functioning of all human organs, but it is nevertheless the cause of coronary heart disease. Over the course of nearly a century of investigation, scientists have deve...

After Endo's initial discovery of compactin, statin development and validation were made possible by collaboration, scientific exchanges, and competition between scientists in Japan and the US over > 15 years of painstaking research. 2/

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20467214/
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

I must note that the Japanese scientist Akira Endo isolated statin (compactin) from the mold in 1972, after coming back to Japan from his 2 years of biochemistry study in Albert Einstein College of Medicine, NY, where he recognized the major heart health issues among people in the US. 1/

Please check out our preprint where we find that mitotic transcription helps ensure ecDNA inheritance through chromosomal tethering:

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

"Where Law Ends Tyranny Begins"

Engraving on the exterior of the United States Department of Justice headquarters.

　A cool innovation to make live-immunofluorescence microscopy!

a man wearing headphones is smiling with the words no way written above him ALT: a man wearing headphones is smiling with the words no way written above him

There is a 0.0% chance that this was written or approved by anyone at NIH with any experience.

2/n

this is a very interesting slide deck from Ropes & Gray, one of the most prestigious & high-caliber law firms in the US

tl;dr we have very good litigators on this issue

Alarming news...

Useful and great guidance and a script on how to contact your congressional representatives to advocate for federal scientific funding. Thank you @ascbiology.bsky.social!

If this is your battle, start here!

Momo sushi & teppan shack

Enjoying a great okonomiyaki in Bushwick, Brooklyn, after being inspired by "Solitary Gourmet"

So sad to hear of the passing of Scott Hawley. In 2008, Michael Ashburner, Scott Hawley, and Casey Bergman held a Drosophila genetics and genomics course in China. This course was instrumental in shaping me as a junior researcher, and I am forever grateful about this eye-opening experience.

In October of last year, my UW colleague David Baker received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his breakthrough creation of an entirely new technology: protein design. The key paper describing the breakthrough had three senior authors: Baker, Varani, and Stoddard. All live and work in Seattle. All were funded to do that work by grants from the NIH. Without that funding, none of this would have happened. Baker did his work in the building where I work. Before Baker, three other scientists building received Nobel Prizes for work done in our building alone: Hartwell, Krebs, and Fisher. Their work has led to critical treatments for cancer and other diseases. Over at the Fred Hutch, NIH-funded research led to the first bone marrow transplants — another medical breakthrough — and another Nobel Prize (Thomas). Every one of these scientists did their work with NIH funding. The NIH generates jobs and fuels the economy. Estimates for the return on investment range from $2.46 per dollar to more than $4.00 per dollar invested. NIH funding generates lifesaving cures for devastating diseases. And NIH funding drives American supremacy in the life sciences, including medicine and agriculture. All of that is on the precipice of destruction. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/trump-cancels-science-reviews-at-nih-worlds-largest-public-biomedical/ Meanwhile, research in Europe and Asia charges ahead. They will not wait for us. We lose jobs; we lose experience; we lose expertise; we lose patents and other intellectual property; we fail to invent lifesaving cures and bring them to market. Those benefits instead accrue to our global competitors. We are setting the seed corn of American supremacy in biomedical research aflame, and for what? I urgently ask you to do everything in your power to save and advance the scientific enterprise. Your colleagues in the Senate must be persuaded that there is no alternative. The nation's wellbeing demands nothing less.

Part of a letter I sent today to my Congressional Representative and Senators.

Raoh - Wikipedia

These are the characters of "Fist of the North Star" with their famous quotes, like one by Raoh (left), " "I have no regrets for the life that I've lived!" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raoh

I just contacted my representatives about the nomination of RFK, Jr and the recent executive orders. Here is what I wrote in my email or said to the staffer on the phone:

Hello-

I am writing/calling on several topics:

Cryogenic Electron Microscopy: MagIC beads for scarce macromolecules Specialized magnetic beads that bind target proteins to a cryogenic electron microscopy grid make it possible to study the structure of protein complexes from dilute samples.

Check out a fantastic @elife.bsky.social article highlighting @yarimura.bsky.social’s MagIC #cryoEM technique - a method using specialized magnetic beads that makes it possible to study the structure of proteins from dilute samples. elifesciences.org/articles/105...

アメリカで育った子供たちが、時々日本語の単語を挟みながら英語で会話しているような感じですか。漢字が結構違うのがネックでしょうが、漢文習ってたことは思わぬところで役立ったりしますよね

Thanks, Manuel!

Cryogenic Electron Microscopy: MagIC beads for scarce macromolecules Specialized magnetic beads that bind target proteins to a cryogenic electron microscopy grid make it possible to study the structure of protein complexes from dilute samples.

A nice commentary article by @carlosmyruela.bsky.social y.social and @beatfierz.bsky.social has been already published! Thank you, Carlos and Beat!
elifesciences.org/articles/105...

Here is our most recent reviewed preprint on MagIC-cryo-EM invented by @yarimura.bsky.social
elifesciences.org/reviewed-pre...

Please note that this is not the final version, or VOR. A revised version (www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...) is currently being reviewed at eLife.

Pleased to share my thoughts on the new eLife publication model.
elifesciences.org/inside-elife...

すばらしい！