This was a really fun and interesting Molecule of the Month to do! Check out the article to see even more elaborate RNA-only structures.

M​atthew D. Giammar et al.: Leopard-EM: an extensible 2D template-matching package to accelerate in situ structural biology ##InSituStructuralBiology##CryoEM##CryoET@usc...##IUCrhttps://journals.iucr.org/paper?S2059798325009982

Congratulations to Matthew and Josh! Check out our extensible Python based 2DTM package, check out our example adaptations for optimizing template parameters and constrained searches and customize to suit your own experiments. Stay tuned for exciting future developments in the pipeline :)

Nominations for the June Almeida award for Mid/Senior-Career Women in Cryo-EM are now open! Submit your nomination via this link www.biophysics.org/awards-fundi... by November 14th to recognize an exceptional woman in our community.

Muyuan Chen has turned structural biology into an immersive experience with his new video game Meowtabolism, now available on Steam. Try the demo here: store.steampowered.com/app/4045010/... Give Muyuan feedback: steamcommunity.com/app/4045010 #ScienceGaming #StructuralBiology #CryoEM #STEMOutreach

🚀 Check out our new preprint on extending the scope of single-particle cryo-EM with 2D template matching! Improved cryo-EM reconstruction of sub-50 kDa complexes using 2D template matching is now available on bioRxiv! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

EU and Australia open talks on closer research partnership through Horizon Europe poke @katequinlan.bsky.social @merlincrossley.bsky.social @marnieblewitt.bsky.social @joelpmackay.bsky.social @pseudokinase.bsky.social www.openaccessgovernment.org/eu-and-austr...

Congrats to MCB's Priya Moorjani on her promotion to MCB Associate Professor of Genetics, Genomics, Evolution, and Development! 👏🥂 mcb.berkeley.edu/news-and-eve...

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

New software from @bronwynalucas.bsky.social Lab for high-resolution 2D template matching of macromolecules inside cells 🔍🔬. #TeamTomo 🧶🧬🧪

Special mention to @joshdcryoem.bsky.social and Matthew Giammar who have become driving forces within the project - I'm excited to see community driven open source flourish in cryo-EM, let's see where things go! 🥰

Thanks Alister! Being a part of broader comminity efforts like teamtomo.org has made it easier to build modular tools and not have to reinvent the wheel every time. Full credit to Matthew and @joshdcryoem.bsky.social

Happy for this to be out! We have documentation and tutorials here. Please give it a try and let us know what you think. lucaslab-berkeley.github.io/Leopard-EM/

First pre-print from the Lucas Lab led by Matthew Giammar and @joshdcryoem.bsky.social online today! We develop a new, extensible Python implementation of 2DTM and apply it to build pixel size optimization, constrained search and characterize molecular motions in situ www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

If you are going to M&M, also see postdoc @joshdcryoem.bsky.social's poster about tilted vs untilted data collection for in situ structural biology www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti....

PhD student @lainahall.bsky.social will be giving a talk about our measurements of FIB-milling damage in cryo-lamellae (with new data!) at M&M on Tuesday next week.

Several Lucas lab members giving talks and posters at meetings this summer! If you are going to ACA2025 this week, see graduate student Matthew Giammar talk about his work building an extensible software architecture for 2DTM in Python (pre-print dropping soon) @acastructuralsci.bsky.social

I am checking in to share this review in case you missed it. This is the first manuscript out of the lab, written together with postdoc @joshdcryoem.bsky.social, and I think it is an important starting point for designing in situ structural biology experiments

Re-upping this opportunity while the application window is still open!

New metric for calling significant detections of proteins in cryoEM images with 2DTM. Driven by Kexin Zhang in @grigoriefflab.bsky.social in collaboration with @pilarcossio.bsky.social

Outstanding opportunity to lead a world-class core facility within @qb3-berkeley.bsky.social. Check it out and spread the word!

I encourage you to apply and join us at @ucberkeleyofficial.bsky.social !

Please spread the word and apply!

Scientific Director, Cal-Cryo. We are looking for an outstanding microscopist to run our cryo-EM facility (two Krioses and an Arctica), increase training, engagement, and collaboration on campus, expand our user base, and join our community of cutting edge cryo-EM researchers. tinyurl.com/ykasna3p

Exciting new position at UC Berkeley! Cal-Cryo is looking for a new scientific director! This is an ideal position for someone who is looking to continue doing science and collaborating with research teams at Berkeley. Come work with us! aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF04670

The Cryo-EM: the next 50 years Symposium held yesterday at @ucberkeleyofficial.bsky.social was a smashing success!!

5. Structural biology in context - a deep dive into all you can accomplish these days with a million-dollar (plus) cryoelectron microscope, and how new methods and software are turning "visual proteomics" into an achievable goal. cen.acs.org/analytical-c...

I made this point to my MCB graduate student class last week. We were discussing what insights we could get from atomic resolution structures and what that really means in biology.

This drove me nuts when I was pregnant. Yes, women have been doing this for eons but also pregnancy was a leading cause of death among women for those same eons.

I reviewed the AlphaFold3 paper from DeepMind for the journal Nature. I tried really hard to get the editors to demand that DeepMind release the code (even an executable) so people could do the many high-throughput studies we saw for AF2 (see image from my review). I failed. So just a server 4 now.

Lunch with some new members of the lab today! Welcome Kithmini, Laina and Matthew!

Gotta keep our students fed!

Our Berkeley garden is blooming in the spring sunshine

This one is for the #cryoEM afficionados. Ten years ago tomorrow (March 14th, 2014), I was at the Tahoe symposium on cryoEM 3D image analysis (taking place again this year, starting today!) and attended a talk by Alberto Bartesaghi, then from NCI-NIH now Duke.

I can’t wait to be a part of this event organized by my colleagues Jim Hurley, Eva Nogales and Gokul Upadhyayula featuring @thevillalab.bsky.social, @cellarchlab.com, Gaia Pigino and UCB’s Ke Xu among others!

Check out this special issue that Alexis Rohou and Peijun Zhang put together. I contributed a perspective on how cryo-EM is going ‘omits scale with help from Alphafold2. Pilar Cossio and Ellen Zhong wrote about continuous heterogeneity and Tim Grant on mass-spec as a sample prep tool, and many more!

Welcome to Bluesky @ulrikeboehm.bsky.social !!

It’s hard to visit Sequoia without thinking about The Overstory by Richard Powers and the way he writes about how time as perceived by a Sequoia is colliding with ours. Even in the only 10 years I’ve been coming to the Sierras there have been changes.

Spending the first few days of the new year communing with giants.

Welcome Dari @kimanius.bsky.social! Looking forward to #teamtomo and #cryoEM developments! 🥳

Welp, goodbye twitter. It was nice while it lasted (in the before times) but I’m not going to try to resuscitate my account from whatever the f**k just went down over there.

End of year celebrations with the Lucas Lab! Grateful to work together with these creative and generous people as we build something new! 🤩💪

Gift link to NYT article on an exciting breakthrough in treating extreme nausea in pregnant women (+ cancer patients). The female MD who conducted the breakthrough study (a) lost her pregnancy at 15 weeks gestation after suffering & (b) was told the problem was in her head. Representation matters.

Not sure how many SerialEM users in #cryoEM and #cryoET are already here, but: SerialEM 4.1 was just released. It comes with many useful new features and script commands, thanks to the tireless work of David Mastronarde bio3d.colorado.edu/ftp/SerialEM...

Anon at #cellbio2023 🤣

Come see us in Germany in April next year!

First weekend as homeowners and we have just completed the customary ritual of hardware store attendance.

In January 2020, a bunch of folks got together to come to with suggestions on how to improve deposition and validation of #cryoEM results. You can now (finally) read the output “white paper”. Better late than never! arxiv.org/abs/2311.17640

Thanks Greg and Chris for pushing developments to democratize #CryoEM ❄️🔬🌍💪 100 kV microscopes that produce beautiful structures should significantly lower the bar to entry (and thus increase access) by dropping the price💸 and and allowing the use of smaller rooms🏫 🧪🧶🧬