Congrats to the newest LSU alumni! @lsuscience.bsky.social

"When chance brought a lone crustacean to [an LSU] scientist’s car park in the USA, he had an unusual response: try to get an exceptionally detailed 3D scan of the animal." - BBC Wildlife Magazine discoverwildlife.com/animal-facts... @lsu.bsky.social

Enjoy this animation of sleep neurons in a fruit fly... and while you are at it, did you know fruit flies are teaching us how some people can get by with 4-5 hours of sleep every night just fine?! It has to do with a genetic variant that boosts mitochondrial function! www.lsu.edu/blog/2026/03...

PhD #3 from the Johnson lab! Congrats @cristianric.bsky.social !

In our newest paper published in @natcomms.nature.com, we show that DAF-16/FOXO and HLH-30/TFRB promote healthy aging, in part, by activating lipid metabolism genes that remodel lysosomes into tubular networks (more in comments below). www.nature.com/articles/s41...

In our newest paper, we show that expression of a familial natural short sleep mutation in flies extends lifespan through enhanced mitochondrial physiology. First first-author paper for former graduate student Pritika Pandey! @pritika26.bsky.social @lsuscience.bsky.social @lsu.bsky.social

Congratulations to Dr. Pritika Pandey! 2nd PhD student from the lab and now she is off to do a postdoc at UNC! 🎉 🎓 @lsuscience.bsky.social

This is a useful distinction - generative vs non-generative AI for writing, and how it relates to the writer's own input

Great video explaining indirect costs from the AAU. I shared this with my lab members.

ER - a "neuron within a neuron". Fascinating work on signal spread via the ER in dendrites. Still leaves open the role of ER continuity in axons.

Some good news amidst all the chaos…New paper published in Biology Open! This work was initiated by two undergraduates (Brennan Mercola and Tatiana Villalobos) and completed by graduate students Jocelyn Wood and Ankita Basu! @biologyopen.bsky.social @lsuscience.bsky.social @lsuresearch.bsky.social

Light-activated binding of a protein to tubular lysosomes:

Are you a graduating undergrad looking for research experience? Come to @lsu.bsky.social and join @lsulagniappe.bsky.social Louisiana Graduate Network in Applied Evolution ("LAGNiAppE": a 1-yr research training program for recent college graduates) Deadline 3/16/25 www.lsu.edu/science/bios...

Hello Bluesky friends! I am a #newPI starting at UC Irvine in April, interested in gene regulation and functional genomics in stem cell models of development (esp neural crest). We are hiring at all levels – please reach out/spread the word! sskimlab.org

A new study finds ants best humans at tests of collective intelligence. Learn more: scim.ag/4h2K0ID

Misregulation of mitochondrial 6mA promotes the propagation of mutant mtDNA and causes aging in C. elegans www.cell.com/cell-metabol...

#PaperAlert we bring wonderful news about @WAutophagy ... our Mericka McCabe and our founders just published a @NatureCellBio article explaining the wonders of our Network...don't miss a bit!! With very valuables testimonials of our volunteers... rdcu.be/d10N6

My first Bluesky paper post! I’m pleased to announce the publication of our single-nucleus atlas of adult neurons from wild-type and long-lived, better performing insulin receptor (daf-2) mutants, by Jon St. Ange and Yifei Weng et al.DOI: 10.1016/j.xgen.2024.100720

A panoramic view of cell population dynamics in mammalian aging 🧪 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

We are happy to report that our journals and community sites now have Bluesky accounts. Follow them at: @dev-journal.bsky.social @jcellsci.bsky.social @jexpbiol.bsky.social @dmmjournal.bsky.social @biologyopen.bsky.social @the-node.bsky.social @prelights.bsky.social @focalplane.bsky.social

Hi! I study how cells form memories. Our lab's most recent study in Nature Commmunications shows that non-neural cells, including kidney cells, can count, detect precise time patterns, and form lasting memories in ways similar to neurons.🧵https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-53922-x

FlyWire #Neuroscience data (green) is now in neuronbridge.janelia.org for matching against #Drosophila light #microscopy data (magenta). Thanks to Cristian Goina, Hideo Otsuna, Rob Svirskas, Konrad Rokicki. See a match in the browser, using mixed surface / volume rendering implemented with #threejs.

Cool new work from the lab by @chris-morrow.bsky.social: Often we think of auto-fluorescence as a hindrance to experiments - but endogenous metabolites have specific fluorescence we can use to determine the metabolic state of the cell - and predict lifespan.. www.nature.com/articles/s42...

mTORC1 activity licenses its own release from the lysosomal surface www.cell.com/molecular-ce...

Finally moved to #Bluesky and happy to share our recent work! We found that hexokinase 1 rapidly forms rings around #mitochondria during energy stress to regulate mitochondrial fission: www.cell.com/molecular-ce... For a quick summary of our findings, check out the comment section.

How do organelles fit together inside a crowded cell? Answering this question requires a way to image many organelles in a whole cell at high resolution with high throughput. Our new preprint shows how to do this in yeast using soft x-ray tomography www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

A 25-year-old woman with type 1 #diabetes started #producing her own #insulin <3 months after receiving a #transplant of reprogrammed #stem #cells. She is first person with the disease to be treated using cells that were extracted from her own body. #breakthrough? www.nature.com/articles/d41...

My starter pack is growing! Please reach out if you use animal models (flies, worms, mice, fish, etc) to study disease mechanisms and want to be added. go.bsky.app/MhUwjSx

Learn about the latest biology of aging research in a beautiful setting! Mark your calendars for the 5th Interventions in Aging Conference, Oct 5-7 2025, Malta. Some great speakers and more coming soon! www.fusion-conferences.com/conference/181 #FusionAging25

'Cells exhibiting a physiological resting state (...) were positively correlated with lifespan, while immune cells displaying evidence of activation or mature phenotypes (...) were generally associated with a shortened lifespan' www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Our lab’s first micro publication! And first first-author paper for graduate student Joshua Gill! www.micropublication.org/journals/bio...