Great opportunity to join the Norwich science community 😉 #newPI

"Postdoc in the job market"

With Watson's death can we stop teaching his simplified version of the Central Dogma (DNA-RNA-protein) & instead teach what Crick actually proposed? It promotes understanding & critical thinking. wellcomecollection.org/works/xmscu3...

Research question for the #epigenetics community: Anyone on here tested using NEB's EM conversion with Illumina Infinium microarrays and want to share there experiences? Please share 🙏

Vertebrate rna directed dna methylation!

📣 Looking for a 3-Year Postdoc @johninnescentre.bsky.social to join my Wellcome project. This is a highly interdisciplinary project that explores chromatin dynamics in 🌱 plant responses across timescales, from circadian rhythms to seasonal changes 📅 Closes on 10 Dec. www.jic.ac.uk/vacancies/36...

Only two days left to register for the UK NonSeed meeting (Dec 12th, Norwich). We’re still accepting flash talks!! www.jic.ac.uk/event/4th-ge...

Consistently an absolutely fantastic meeting - don’t miss out on an opportunity to interact with an awesome bunch of non-seed enthusiasts 🌱 😃 🧬

The Matthew Effect is alive and well in academia - always makes me wary of programs aimed at identifying rising stars in an already highly talented pool... elifesciences.org/reviewed-pre...

Please share, deadline approaching soon!

Conrad Hal Waddington was born OTD in 1905. His “epigenetic landscape” is a diagrammatic representation of the constraints influencing embryonic development. On his 50th birthday, his colleagues gave him a pinball machine on the model of the epigenetic landscape. 🧪 🦫🦋 🌱🐋 #HistSTM #philsci #evobio

When people celebrate the individual genius of folks in science, they should also mourn the collective loss of genius of folks who were actively discouraged or disadvantaged from a career in science because of the same person(s)

It is possible to recognise that Watson's treatment of Franklin was despicable and at the same time to acknowledge that Matthew is right.

Goodnight all.

On the event of James Watson's death, I highly recommend this 2023 commentary from @matthewcobb.bsky.social and Nathaniel Comfort with crucial new insights into the discovery of the double helix. (And also check out Cobb's brand new biography of Francis Crick) www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Looking for a good read? @tatsuyanobori.bsky.social is featured on The Scientist sharing his scientific journey from Japan to the UK. “It circles back to my initial ecological interest and how single-cell level interactions might have a ripple effect on the actual ecosystem."

Our latest paper has just been published in Cell! doi.org/10.1016/j.ce... We developed a new method called MCC ultra, which allows 3D chromatin structure to be visualised with a 1 base pair pixel size.

Promising epigenome editing paper by the @c-jake-harris.bsky.social lab! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

'When Mendel began his investigation, his first inclination was to try breeding mice of different colors. However, before his mice experiment really got going, Mendel was forced to switch the subject of his experiments to peas by a prudish bishop uncomfortable with animals having sex in the abbey.'

Actually not true. He applied twice, but the first was for $30k. Which he got. He only applied once for *major* funding ($6m – around $20m today). he got $900k, still pretty good.

Nature suggests you use their "Manuscript Adviser" bot to get advice before submitting I uploaded the classic Watson & Crick paper about DNA structure, and the Adviser had this to say about one of the greatest paper endings of the century:

"he applied for a grant only once in his life"

#plantjob If you are interested on the evolution of plant-microbe interactions and have a PhD degree obtained between 1st January 2024 and 31st December 2025, come join us and apply to the "Juan de la Cierva" postdoctoral contracts!. Drop a mail with your CV + motivation letter!

My article in tomorrow's @theobserveruk.bsky.social now online. But go and buy a copy!

It‘s not officially out for another week (2 weeks in the US), but some copies have escaped into the wild! Happy reading!

It's a big one @matthewcobb.bsky.social; can't wait to read it! Thanks @turchil.bsky.social for the birthday gift 🤓

1/ 🚀 AEBP2 isn’t what we thought. You were told that AEBP2 promotes PRC2 activity on chromatin. We found the opposite: the most prevalent AEBP2 isoform inhibits PRC2 activity. 👉 surl.li/cgwqcq A thread 🧵

When all your PCRs fail, except for the negative control 😱

Spooky season has arrived! 👻 We held our annual Pumpkin Carving Competition at @thesainsburylab.bsky.social —vote for your favourite carve! 🎃🕯️

Very happy to see our paper published online natcomms.nature.com. Thank you to @wellcometrust.bsky.social for funding this work during my time with @robklose.bsky.social and David Booth! Thanks also to collaborators @garcialabms.bsky.social @alexdemendoza.bsky.social and the other authors!

Very excited to announce that our collaborative manifesto for 🌱 #PlantScience #Education has now been published! Educators from >10 countries and 30 institutions have contributed to it and we are incredibly proud of the final output. Here is a short thread 🧵1/4 doi.org/10.1002/ppp3...

Lab’s first paper is out!! We show the first structures of #Asgard #chromatin by #cryo-EM 🧬❄️ Asgard histones form closed and open hypernucleosomes. Closed are conserved across #Archaea, while open resemble eukaryotic H3–H4 octasomes and are Asgard-specific. More here: www.cell.com/molecular-ce...

Spread the word! There is a professor position opening at our University @upcite.bsky.social. There are several possible (great) labs to join, but if you are interested in DNA methylation and epigenetics in mammals, don't hesitate to contact me directly!

In 1911, Impressionist painter Mary Cassatt was diagnosed with cataracts, where lenses in the eye become clouded with protein deposits as we age. A failed cataract surgery left her essentially blind. Her last painting was 1914. Claude Monet was diagnosed with cataracts in 1912...

My commentary published in Current Biology! “Plant regeneration: Breaking the silence of totipotency by reprogramming a stomatal precursor cell” Full text available → authors.elsevier.com/a/1lzT-3QW8S...

Shortlisted candidates will be invited to give a seminar at the Fellows Conference, which will be held on 10 March 2026. Candidates who win Fellowships will be offered a Tenure Track Group Leader position from the outset, initially for 5 years. Find out more: www.jic.ac.uk/training-car...

That merely being “under review” by a Nature family journal is offered as a quality proxy for a paper is a tragic illustration of the extent to which academia is addicted to brands and outsources evaluation

Only Lord Farquaad is missing

Excited to welcome Bob to Norwich! @johninnescentre.bsky.social @thesainsburylab.bsky.social

One of the most exciting works of my career, years in the making. We used high-throughput precision genome editing to test the fitness effects of thousands of natural variants. Our findings challenge the long-held assumption that common variants are inconsequential. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

I had the honour of giving a talk at the Biochemical Society conference and finally received the medal. Grateful once again to everyone who made this possible! #BiochemEvent

@samtmugford.bsky.social from @johninnescentre.bsky.social gave an excellent 2025 Research Support Award Lecture on his work with @saskiahogenhout.bsky.social, exploring plant–insect interactions. #BiochemEvent

Our Plant Proteins meeting has begun! Starting the day with his 2025 Early Career Research Award Lecture, Dr Tatsuya Nobori discussed the development of PHYTOMap, a novel method for multiplexed single-cell 3D spatial gene expression analysis in whole-mount plant tissues.

Looking for a PhD on stem cells, microenvironment and gene regulation/alternative splicing. Join us for this great project with @whatchamacaulay.bsky.social

Two years ago we undertook a volunteer-driven effort to reannotate the #Arabidopsis thaliana genome. Over 70 researchers in labs all over the world contributed. Read our latest status update 🧪➡️ phoenixbioinfo.org/get-ready-ta... #TAIR12 #plantbiology #plantscience #scisky

Sixty years ago, Crick suggested that the LMB, and later the proposed EMBO, should work on the “complete solution” of E. coli, with the aim of understanding *everything* about it. We are still far from that, but this is another step forward. More in my biography of Crick (out next month!) and here:

And @newphyt.bsky.social continues it's great series of Profiles with this one on @pdchristine.bsky.social: nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.... #PlantScience #PlantDevelopment #PlantImmunity #PlantLuminaries

Happy birthday RNA Pol II #otd #SciSky 56 years ago www.nature.com/articles/224...

1/10 Genome maintenance by telomerase is a fundamental process in nearly all eukaryotes. But where does it come from? Today, we report the discovery of telomerase homologs in a family of antiviral RTs, revealing an unexpected evolutionary origin in bacteria. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Our latest paper on a histone methyltransferase-independent function of PRC2 controlling small RNA dynamics during programmed DNA elimination in Paramecium is now published in #NAR. #RNAbiology #TEsky #smallRNAs #PRC2 #DNAelimination 1/5 academic.oup.com/nar/article-...