Come and join our team! We currently have two PhD scholarships between Danny Wilson and myself We are a supportive, productive, and inclusive research group studying parasite cell biology @ The University of Adelaide in beautiful South Australia scholarships.adelaide.edu.au/Scholarships...

A dynamic barrier: remodeling of the nuclear envelope during closed mitosis in malaria parasites | mSphere journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

A dynamic barrier: remodeling of the nuclear envelope during closed mitosis in malaria parasites | mSphere

When I first encountered the paper by Weiner et al. in 2011 (1), I was struck not just by the data, but by the questions it raised. Their use of focused ion beam scanning electron microscopy (FIB-SEM) to generate high-resolution 3D reconstructions of nuclear pore organization across the intraerythrocytic cycle of Plasmodium falciparum offered a tantalizing glimpse into the nuclear envelope (NE) of a parasite that replicates unlike any model eukaryote (2). The idea that this structure—a defining feature of eukaryotic cells—could remain intact throughout mitosis, while still accommodating spindle formation, organelle inheritance, and gene regulation, challenged my assumptions about cell division.

journals.asm.org

Thanks very much to the wonderful folks in the new Flinders Health & Medical Research Building for hosting me on Tuesday! Cheers to Nick Eyre and @evahesping.bsky.social for the invitation to speak and for showing me around the beautiful new facility!

Claire Jessup@betacellgirl.bsky.social · last yr.

Fabulous CMPH Biosciences talk this week by @benliffner.bsky.social about Expansion #Microscopy to visualise parasites - so pretty!!! Great demonstration of how an improved method can give new answers 👏 Thanks for visiting #HMRB @flindersuniversity.bsky.social

Go Long Huynh! Fancy cell biology and fancy microscopy on artemisinin resistance in Plasmodium parasites at the BioMalPar conference #EMBLMalaria @benliffner.bsky.social @sabsalon.bsky.social @events.embl.org

Crick researchers have uncovered how the intestinal Cryptosporidium parasite uses a protein to alter its host’s gut environment, enabling the parasite to survive and replicate. www.crick.ac.uk/news/2025-04...

Researchers uncover how intestinal parasite Cryptosporidium alters host cells

Researchers at the Francis Crick Institute have shown that the Cryptosporidium parasite exports a protein into infected intestinal cells, altering the gut environment and enabling the parasite to surv...

crick.ac.uk

The new OrthoMCL-7 with OrthoFinder clustering, Similar Groups, and Phylogenetic Trees is 🌟 now live 🌟at orthomcl.org, part of the @veupathdb.bsky.social family of resources. The previous version of OrthoMCL-6.21 is still available as a Legacy site.

Cell biology is producing mountains of microscopy data, usually a given paper got that data for some purpose, but what if you could find relevant data that you could use to answer your own questions? in her new preprint, @marymirvis.bsky.social develops Systematic Review methods to do just that

Mary Mirvis@marymirvis.bsky.social · last yr.

New(ish) preprint! 📰What whole-cell patterns emerge from the arrangement, morphologies, and interactions of organelles in the 3D space of the cell? What would we see if we could gather ALL the whole-cell reconstruction data that's out there in one place? www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... 🧵 1/11

🚨 New preprint alert! 🚨 We’ve uncovered a key player in malaria parasite cell division—meet PfAnchor, the first apicoplast-specific dynamin adaptor protein! Check the thread below 🧵for more details. #U_ExM #Malaria #Apicoplast www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

An Essential Adaptor for Apicoplast Fission and Inheritance in Malaria Parasites

Blood-stage Plasmodium falciparum parasites rely on a non-photosynthetic plastid, the apicoplast, for survival, making it an attractive target for antimalarial intervention. Like the mitochondrion, th...

biorxiv.org

Unlocking new understanding of Plasmodium sporozoite biology with expansion microscopy https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.04.09.648058v1

Unlocking new understanding of Plasmodium sporozoite biology with expansion microscopy https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.04.09.648058v1

Our study looking at sporozoite development and salivary gland invasion using expansion microscopy is now up as a pre-print! A little thread below about this interesting study that was born out of a seminar 🧵 @sabsalon.bsky.social @jvr-lab.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Come and work with us! We have a 3yr Research Assistant role working on parasites with fascinating biology If you have experience working with mouse models, parasites, or are excited by the challenge of working on a new organism, I'd encourage you to apply! careers.adelaide.edu.au/cw/en/job/51...

Learn more about South Australia's new university for the future.

careers.adelaide.edu.au

With Guillermina Ramirez-SanJuan we are very happy to announce the upcoming Latsis Symposium " Shaping microbial life in a changing environment" over July 8-10 at #EPFL Registrations are open til May 23rd. LINK: www.epfl-latsis-2025.org

Ten years of bigger samples, better views mcgovern.mit.edu/2025/03/03/t... Thank you for including our lab's contribution in your remarkable piece about what I believe is the most revolutionary method for studying tiny, fascinating apicomplexans. @benliffner.bsky.social @jvr-lab.bsky.social

Ten years of bigger samples, better views - MIT McGovern Institute

Nearly 150 years ago, scientists began to imagine how information might flow through the brain based on the shapes of neurons they had seen under the microscopes of the time. With today’s imaging tech...

mcgovern.mit.edu

Congratulations @benliffner.bsky.social. #U_ExM #Malaria revolutionized studying the cell biology of Apicomplexan parasites, and I love the work we did together ;-)

A massive thanks to @bladerlab.bsky.social for the opportunity to put this mSphere of influence article together! Also @dvorinlab.bsky.social, @ebertiaux.bsky.social, Brochet Lab, & @centriolelab.bsky.social for doing science that shows off why parasites are cool! journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...

mSphere of Influence: The ever-expanding universe of parasite cell biology | mSphere

Single-celled apicomplexan parasites have to grow, replicate, and divide all of the organelles of a eukaryotic cell all while being a tiny fraction of the size of most other eukaryotes. For example, a...

journals.asm.org

Cryptosporidium modifies intestinal microvilli through an exported virulence factor!! Phenomenal work from the newly DR’ed Elena Rodrigues www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Cryptosporidium modifies intestinal microvilli through an exported virulence factor

Cryptosporidium is a common intestinal infection of vertebrates and a significant threat to public health. Within the epithelial layer of the intestine, the parasite invades and replicates. Infected cells are readily detected under the microscope by the presence of elongated microvilli, particularly around the vacuole where the parasite resides. Here, we identify a family of Cryptosporidium virulence factors that are exported into the host cell during infection and localise to the microvilli. We examine the trafficking and function of the most highly expressed family member, MVP1, which appears to control the elongation of microvilli through engagement of host EBP50 and CDC42. Remarkably, this mechanism closely mirrors that of an enteropathogenic Escherichia coli virulence factor, MAP, which is also known to drive host microvilli elongation during infection. This highlights a unique instance where eukaryotic and prokaryotic virulence factors have convergently evolved to modulate host actin structures through a similar mechanism. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest.

biorxiv.org

Would have loved to be able to be there in person, but excited and proud to see a great colleague and a great friend in James Blauwkamp deliver a fantastic PhD Defence! Been a wonderful experience to see you grow as a scientist over the years and excited to see what's next 🎉 @sabsalon.bsky.social

Continuing our Host-Pathogen session, @benliffner.bsky.social from the University of Adelaide shared how expansion microscopy has enabled his work imaging malaria parasites during their development in the mosquito 🦟🔬 A deep dive into how these parasites grow and evolve within their mosquito host!

Great to get the opportunity to present our work on expansion microscopy of mosquito-stage malaria parasites at Lorne I&I this morning! Cheers to @theviin.bsky.social for the ECR award that allowed me to attend this meeting #LorneIandI

Two fantastic papers came out in Science identifying Plasmodium essential genes using piggyBac screens. Both datasets are available in PlasmoDB! 🔎 Look up the phenotype graphs of your favorite gene: plasmodb.org/plasmo/app/r... plasmodb.org/plasmo/app/r...

Delivering this year's Hertzog Oration is David Underhill coming to us from @cedarssinai.bsky.social in LA, USA. David tells us about pathogen recognition and all things phagocytosis #LorneIandI

Session 3 of #lorneiandi off to a great start! Our first presenter was Dr Mehreen Datoo from The University of Oxford @ox.ac.uk who spoke about clinical development and success so far of the R21/Matrix-M malaria vaccine.

A real honour to receive the inaugural Kat Gaus Award at APMC13 last week @australianmms.bsky.social supported by Zeiss Microscopy Australia & New Zealand. Cheers to everybody for supporting me doing weird and wonderful light microscopy experiments on parasites over the years!

Happy to share that our work on PfFBXO1 is finally online.. www.nature.com/articles/s42... Thanks for the support and congratulations to the team: Jeffrey Dvorin, @bladerlab.bsky.social, Gustavo Baptista and Chris West

PfFBXO1 is essential for inner membrane complex formation in Plasmodium falciparum during both asexual and transmission stages - Communications Biology

Functional characterization of PfFBXO1, utilizing cell biology, genetics, and biochemistry, demonstrates essential roles for this protein in formation of the inner membrane complex in asexual merozoit...

nature.com

A massive thanks to @sturalph.bsky.social @ijayas.bsky.social, Donna Whelan, Ashley Rozario, and Dawson Ling for a fantastic session and discussion on expansion microscopy yesterday at #APMC13

Our paper on U-ExM for mosquito tissues (MoTissU-ExM) in BMC methods! Great collaboration with @sabsalon.bsky.social and @benliffner.bsky.social bmcmethods.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....

Mosquito Tissue Ultrastructure-Expansion Microscopy (MoTissU-ExM) enables ultrastructural and anatomical analysis of malaria parasites and their mosquito - BMC Methods

Background Study of malaria parasite cell biology is challenged by their small size, which can make visualisation of individual organelles difficult or impossible using conventional light microscopy. ...

bmcmethods.biomedcentral.com

Is there anybody heading to the Asia-Pacific Microscopy Congress in Brisbane this coming February who has done/is doing expansion microscopy? If so, please DM me

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Comparative 3D ultrastructure of Plasmodium falciparum gametocytes - Nature Communications

Evers et al. generated exceptionally detailed 3D reconstructions of different malaria parasite stages responsible for pathology and spread of the disease. The nanometre scale ultrastructures shed ligh...

nature.com

Starting the new year from a different office 🐑