No fooling, Avogadro 2.0.0 is finally here! Rebuilt from the ground up: fast modern rendering, improved stability, designed for the next generation of molecular, biomolecule, and materials research & education. 🧪 ⚗️ avogadro.cc/install/ discuss.avogadro.cc #opensource #openscience #compchem

Home Solar xkcd.com/3226/

Awesome representation from @uwmadscience.bsky.social at the @asbmb.bsky.social #ASBMB2026 meeting in DC! #ScienceServesUsAll

Congratulations to my student Dennis Bolshakov and his coauthors @weix.us, Tommy, and @born2raisecell.bsky.social on making the cover of ACS Synthetic Biology! A great paper and an awesome cover 🥳 pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

Quick thing one can do for science! See also 5calls.org - calling your representatives is often even more effective than an email.

Our work on the E3 ligase mechanism of target-directed microRNA degradation is now published! Amazing collaboration with Brenda Schulman’s lab led by @jakobfarnung.bsky.social and @elenaslo.bsky.social, with special thanks to @wyppeter.bsky.social, Lianne Blodgett, and Daniel Lin! tinyurl.com/Z8TDMD

Spam musubi is divine

The deadline for the submission of papers to the special issue on the International Yeast Meetings of 2025 has been extended to 31 March. Papers should be connected to one of the meetings listed below. Hurry up and don't miss this chance! More information at: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal...

Evolution of error correction through a need for speed | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Great to see our paper on light-intensity dependent swimming patterns in #Chlamydomonas out now in Phys Rev Lett. as an Editors' suggestion! With a nice commentary by @philipcball.bsky.social. Chlamy actively modulate the beat planes of their #cilia! journals.aps.org/prl/abstract... #protistsonsky

New in ACS SynBio: led by Dennis Bolshakov, we used the awesome power of yeast to define how expression levels, noise, and sequence program the dynamics of synthetic protein waves, allowing us to genetically encode new cellular timescales stable over generations! pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10....

Thrilled that the lab's first @hhmijanelia.bsky.social project is up on bioRxiv! Story behind the story to follow. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

New preprint! We found that the flavin-dependent halogenase RebH catalyzes sequence-tolerant Trp bromination in peptides 🧪https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2025.12.17.694899v1

Congrats to Badger senior Evelyn Browning: a 2026 Marshall Scholar!👏 One of only 43 awardees in the country this year, she will investigate genetic variants related to neurodevelopmental conditions as a grad student at @cam.ac.uk & @sangerinstitute.bsky.social.

Join us for Rohith Rajasekaran's (@born2raisecell.bsky.social) PhD thesis defense on Friday, Nov. 21! Rajasekaran's research was completed in the Coyle Lab (@cellraiser.bsky.social). More info: today.wisc.edu/events/view/...

Thrilled to share our work on the 🔥 single-celled predator Podophrya collini, which rewires its cell morphology to hunt more efficiently. Huge thanks to our amazing team—Amy, Lauren, Omaya, Marine, Mari, and especially Scott—for making this shine! ✨

How do cells adapt morphology to function? In a 🔥 preprint by @zjmaggiexu.bsky.social , with @dudinlab.bsky.social and @amyweeks.bsky.social , we identify a self-organizing single-cell morphology circuit that optimizes the feeding trap structure of the suctorian P. collini. 🧵 tinyurl.com/4k8nv926

Not being a bit weird might be the weirdest thing of all 🐈‍⬛🤍

Barred owls are native to Wisconsin, but invasive out west. New UW–Madison research reveals they’re preying on at-risk species and disrupting entire ecosystems as they spread down the West Coast.

🚨Just in press @asbmb.bsky.social JBC!🚨 Alex & Chioma's paper detailing the interaction of Fe(II) with an intact membrane His kinase for the first time! Binding stoichiometry ✅ Fe(II) structure ✅ Direct observation of selectivity ✅ Signal transmission pathway ✅ Read more here: tinyurl.com/49wdkecu

Happy to share our latest work, led by Sierra Love and in collaboration with Melissa Jurica's lab at UCSC and @danglab.bsky.social at U. Minnesota-Twin Cities. This work was funded by the Edward P. Evans Foundation/EvansMDS. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Hi Everyone for the @asbmb.bsky.social 2026 annual meeting there is now a deferred payment option for federal employees and scientists impacted by the government shutdown. Information below and further details at the link. www.asbmb.org/annual-meeti...

Andrea A. Putnam, a UW School of Medicine and Public Health assistant professor of biomolecular chemistry, has been named a 2025 Packard Foundation Fellow in Science and Engineering. Congratulations, Dr. Putnam!

Hi structural biology friends @nucleosomepolice.bsky.social @kellythd-nguyen.bsky.social @sjorsscheres.bsky.social @bjgreber.bsky.social @cijilim.bsky.social @nogaleslab.bsky.social and many others...

Want to acquire #ExM images like this and help us understand the true extent of cytoskeletal diversity across the tree of life? This position might be for you! embl.wd103.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/EMBL/j... With @dudinlab.bsky.social @embl.org @biology-unige.bsky.social @moorefound.bsky.social

1. Federal funding for research promotes tech, biomedical, and scientific discovery in the US, and provides training for the sci/tech workforce that has brought immeasurable wealth to the US over the past 75 years. Today's executive order includes a provision that will obliterate both functions.

Excited to share our latest: we engineered the reactivity of a bacterial E1-like enzyme for ATP-driven modification of C termini. Our tool mimics the logic of peptide bond formation in biology for precision modification of proteins in vitro. 🧪https://rdcu.be/ewN7C

I wrote a quick-start guide for people to replicate this across the country. It was, in our experience, a very effective way to get real action in a short amount of time. People are willing to talk to scientists! And when you provide everything, they are happy to contact their reps too. Try it!

Congratulations to Rohith Rajasekaran, who was awarded a @uwmadisoncals.bsky.social Distinguished Graduate Fellowship! In the @cellraiser.bsky.social Lab, Rajasekaran focuses on the MinDE reaction-diffusion system. Learn more about his research: biochem.wisc.edu/2025/06/12/r...

Terrifying but also good fodder for undergraduate biochemistry course homework and exams... www.pnas.org/doi/full/10....

🧬 New preprint out today, years in the making! Rucker et al. traces ancient nitrogen fixation over 2 billion years through engineering & synthetic evolution. Supports reliability of N-isotope biosignatures on Earth & beyond. Congrats @hollyrucker.bsky.social! 🚀 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Listen to Karolin!

Friendly amendment: May was brutal for the US. Trump sowed mass fear and confusion with a slew of illegal and unconstitutional orders. He faced no consequences other than being asked nicely to please stop, and so of course he continues to do destroy our country with this exact same playbook.

In the latest #Yeast research article of the series #FantasticYeasts, Pei-Jie Han, Feng-Yan Bai & team describe a new yeast species isolated from a Chinese forest: Saccharomycopsis yichangensis, that can prey on Saccharomyces cerevisiae and other yeasts 😲 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

This is absolutely terrible news. With the shifting regulatory climate (i.e., antivax ratfuckery), Moderna has withdrawn their application for their eagerly anticipated COVID-flu combo vaccine. This vaccine offered better protection than getting each shot separately. h/t @merz.bsky.social

I just left a comment. If you are concerned that RFK Jr.'s FDA chief Marty Makary is limiting the Novavax COVID booster to those over 65 or with underlying conditions, and may do the same for Pfizer/Moderna as well, consider leaving a comment as well.

Congratulations Dr. Lauren Ehehalt on a fantastic thesis defense! We're so excited to see all your future work at Eastman Chemical Co.! 🥳🎉🎓

Congratulations to Purdue's ASBMB Student Chapter, led by Orla Hart, on winning the 2025 Outstanding Chapter Award. The group was honored for its work developing STEM outreach initiatives for low-income and minority students in Lafayette, Indiana: ow.ly/pip350VO0mr.

PhD Timeline xkcd.com/3081

Let 1000 lawsuits bloom

Eugenics is fake science. But it’s creeping back into public discourse—through political rhetoric, bad policy, & scientific silence. We’re seeing this pseudoscience rebrand itself once again as legitimate. We must call it what it is—& stop it before it spreads further. We’ve seen where this leads.

Pauses, interruptions and rescissions of research funds are slowing work that is vital for developing lifesaving treatments for chronic and infectious diseases. ASBMB is a member of @c4lifesciences.bsky.social, which calls on the administration to restore funding. ➡️Read CLS' letter: bit.ly/4jmyRDL.

If you’re looking to create and/or visualize (interactively or for figures) protein alignments, I added figures & a video to some of my favorites to my blog & my downloadable guides with links. Hope they help! #365DaysOfScience #chemsky #biochemsky bit.ly/proteinalign... youtu.be/BesY9nHribI

The notice and COMMENT PERIOD OPENED TODAY AND CLOSES MAY 23. Anyone who would like to register an objection or comment should go to this page and click on the green “public comment” button at the top: www.federalregister.gov/documents/20... 6/n

📣Science doesn’t stop at discovery — it drives action. Now, more than ever, we need passionate voices to bring evidence, research & reason to public dialogue. ⬇️Apply for ASBMB's advocacy training program by May 5 to use your knowledge to drive change. www.asbmb.org/advocacy/adv... #ASBMBAdvocates

"Climate change is not a future problem. It is a NOW problem [...] When we defund weather, climate, & environmental research, we blindfold ourselves in the middle of a burning house." #EarthDay op-ed from @irinaclimatemom.bsky.social & @michaelemann.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/philadel...

1. I study how science works as a collective endeavor to make sense of the physical world. I also study how misinformation about science spreads and affects society. There are fewer examples more poignant than a Minnesota bill that would criminalize mRNA vaccines as weapons of mass destruction.

So, I have been learning about machine learning - if you want to learn with me, see our recently published article! Many thanks to all the trainees who wrote and edited this mammoth of a book chapter and the reviewers for their effort. Check it out! doi.org/10.1002/cpz1...

Good luck Ye @uwbiochem.bsky.social on your thesis defense on Wednesday!!!

PRESSURE WORKS, DORKS! 💪