Congratulations to Max Spicer on the completion of his PhD! The title of Spicer’s talk was “Electrostatic control of apoptotic chromatin compaction”.

Chuffed to have defended my PhD thesis! Big thanks to @danielgerlich.bsky.social for all his support and guidance; and to the wonderful @gerlichlab.bsky.social, @imbavienna.bsky.social & @viennabiocenter.bsky.social for being an incredible scientific home these past few years. On to the next :)

New preprint out!🧬 How do cells keep replicated sister chromatids linked for DNA repair while folding 3D loops for gene expression? Extrusion folds DNA but separates sisters, while cohesion connects them, risking mutual interference. How do they coexist?🧵👇 🔗 doi.org/10.64898/2026.05.02.722390 1/6

Excited to share this work done during my PhD here in Vienna! We show how chromatin compaction prevents the release of fragmented DNA in apoptosis, and use new tools to study the mechanism of compaction itself. See our summary/"bluetorial" below & our preprint here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

I am happy to share that my postdoctoral work in the @gerlichlab.bsky.social at @imbavienna.bsky.social is finally out 🎉! Our study reveals how cohesin guides focused and accurate homology search. Read more 👉 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... Follow along for key insights and updates! 🧵

🚨 New Science paper from the Gerlich lab! The team shows how cohesin helps broken DNA find the right template: by opening local DNA loops to shrink the search area and by keeping the damaged strand close to its sister copy: science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adw0566

The Vienna BioCenter Summer School 2026 call is now open for talented undergrads, it's a great opportunity for students who are interested in graduate study in the life sciences. Please RT https://training.vbc.ac.at/summer-school/

Huge congratulations to @mfdspicer.bsky.social, PhD student in our lab, for winning the Best Poster Prize at the 2nd Spatial Genome Organization Conference! 🎉 A proud moment for the lab and well-deserved recognition for his creativity and dedication. 👏 @fusionconf.bsky.social #SGO25