Come join us! If you’re interested in structural biology and photosynthesis, this is a great opportunity.

We currently have an opening for a PhD position in the lab. If you are interested in pursuing some serious structural biology of photosynthetic and chloroplast processes please apply. Prerequisite is previous experience in cryoEM and/or phototrophs. stellenangebote.uni-marburg.de/jobposting/2...

Exciting new work from Elaine Wang, PhD student co-supervised with Natalie Zeytuni! Check out their latest structural insights into native Type V fimbriae from Porphyromonas gingivalis: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Structural tuning of native type V fimbriae shapes mechanical specialization in Porphyromonas gingivalis

Bacterial fimbriae are central to adhesion, colonization, and biofilm formation, yet how related fimbriae systems are structurally and mechanically specialized within the same pathogen remains poorly ...

biorxiv.org

Structural basis of biofilm formation mediated by the Pseudomonas aeruginosa fibrillar adhesin CdrA led by @olivia--smith.bsky.social Collaboration with @alexbateman1.bsky.social , Andres Floto and @geiselbiofilm.bsky.social labs

Some bacteria do not live as individuals. They build multicellular filaments and connect neighboring cells through tiny cell-cell junctions. Cyanobacteria are among the most beautiful examples 😍 In our new paper, we reveal first molecuar insights on the cyanobacterial septal junction architecture 🧵

Excited to share my paper! 🥳 Today in #Nature we reveal an 8 MDa Hdr electron bifurcating super-assembly in class I methanogens that couples the first and last steps of hydrogenotrophic methanogenesis. A lineage-specific adaptation to anaerobic niches. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

1/ Happy to share our preprint! The Mtr complex catalyses the second-to-last step of the methanogenesis and is an essential bioenergetic machine in most methanogenic archaea. Anaerobic cryo-EM of Mtr reveals a nitrogenase-like metallocluster bound at its active site! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Excited to share our new preprint! How does the cyanobacterial hydrogenase HoxEFUYH drive photosynthetic H₂ production? Using #cryoEM, biochemistry, FTIR and EPR spectroscopy, we reveal its molecular mechanism, including the basis of electron bifurcation/confurcation. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Electron confurcation drives photosynthetic H2 production in cyanobacteria

Cyanobacteria are major contributors to global photosynthesis and are intensively studied for sustainable green H2 production. Central to this process is the bidirectional [NiFe]-hydrogenase HoxEFUYH,...

biorxiv.org

🛠️💉It's time for engineering contractile injection systems! @chipericson.bsky.social & @davidschaumann.bsky.social introduce programmable CIS - PROCIS, combining tail length control, non-native cargo loading, and cell retargeting all in one system! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... 🧵 1/5

We're super excited to share MissAlignment: a new ML-based approach to reference-free tilt series alignment, spearheaded by @martenchaillet.bsky.social. We think it's going to make your cryo-ET life a lot better. Preprint: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... Code: github.com/warpem/miss-... 🧶 Thread:

Big news for correlative cryogenic SMLM/ET! With my colleague Soheil, we (Mahamid and @jonasries.bsky.social labs) indicate lamella-specific illumination can allow 500-1500x higher laser intensities, opening massive new possibilities for correlative imaging #teamtomo www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Photosynthetic bacteria helped shape Planet Earth. Among them cyanobacteria—microbes that produced the oxygen in Earth’s atmosphere & made complex life possible. They have captivated scientists for decades by offering insights into how life evolved from single cells into multicellular organisms.

Cyanobacteria are an ancient clade of phototrophic prokaryotes. But out of all the cyanobacteria available, why did Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803 become the default laboratory model? This #JBacteriology review offers insights: asm.social/2TD

1/ Excited to share our preprint! 🥳 Degradation of aromatic compounds, including BTEX pollutants, requires highly endergonic aromatic ring reduction. Using #cryoEM and in situ #cryoET, we show how BCRII couples electron bifurcation modules in one giant redox machine www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

How do “LEGO-like” electron-bifurcating modules combine to drive degradation in BTEX-contaminated ecosystems? Check out our latest preprint, where we use cryo-EM and cryo-ET to reveal how the 1 MDa BCRII complex powers extremely endergonic aromatic ring reduction. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

The cartwheel was first visualized ~70 years ago in the symbiont Trichonympha in the wood termite gut. We’ve discovered the cartwheel’s secret: a unique zigzag stacking of SAS-6 tetramers that facilitates the iconic 9-fold symmetry of cilia. #cellbiology #teamtomo #SAS6 #cartwheel

One of biggest mysteries in biology: how did complex eukaryotic cells evolve from simple microbes? ~1.8 billion years ago, an archaeal cell likely merged with a bacterium to form the first eukaryotic cell, but can we ever find direct evidence of this transformative event? 🦠 🚶‍♂️

Excited to share our new paper in @natcomms.nature.com ! Here, we present the cryo-EM structure of the Cytc₆:PSI complex from Chlamydomonas reinhardtii👇 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Huge congratulations, @rnfr2d2.bsky.social !!! 🎉🏆 This is such a well-deserved recognition of your hard work and the incredible science behind your PhD.

GBM (Gesellschaft für Biochemie und Molekularbiologie)@gbmev.bsky.social · 5mo ago

The GBM #PhDAward was presented to Anuj Kumar for his PhD thesis on the „Structural basis of CO2 fixation and energy conservation in acetogens“ Congratulations, Anuj! #MK2026 @unimarburg.bsky.social

Carbonic anhydrase catalyses the interconversion of CO2 and HCO3- and helps increasing the net-CO2 concentration inside cells. Why? CO2-reducing enzymes like RuBisCO are notoriously slow and ineffective. However, import of HCO3- is typically coupled to ATP consumption...

Time for a thread!🧵 How different is the molecular organization of thylakoids in “higher” plants🌱? To find out, we teamed up with @profmattjohnson.bsky.social to dive into spinach chloroplasts with #CryoET ❄️🔬. Curious? ..Read on! #TeamTomo #PlantScience 🧪 🧶🧬 🌾 elifesciences.org/articles/105... 1/🧵

Cryo-EM structure of Chlamydomonas Photosystem I complexedwith the alternative electron donor cytochrome c6 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.09.08.674899v1 #cryoEM

Our new preprint: how photoprotection is spatially coordinated with energy metabolism. Photosystem I is major source of radicals. We report EM structure of PSI in complex with superoxide dismutase SOD: direct link between energy conversion & oxidative stress defence www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Let's unpack what our new ferredoxin paper is about, shall we? ✨ She et al., Adv. Sci. (2025) doi.org/10.1002/advs...

a cartoon drawing of a genie holding a snake and a boat

ALT: a cartoon drawing of a genie holding a snake and a boat

media.tenor.com

We have a preprint for you EHD2 forms rings on caveolae necks, in contrast to most EHDs forming helices. We determined its structure on membranes and show that N-term acts as a spacer By Elena, Vasya @vasiliimikirtumov.bsky.social, Jeff &Oli Daumke www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Proud to present the lab's latest work. The full structure of the sodium translocating methyltransferase (Mtr) bound to a small oxygen-responsive small protein MtrI. Work by Tristan and together with @schmitzstreitslab.bsky.social . www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.06.02.657420v1

Ross @milton-group.bsky.social came up with a very similar idea: how about introducing cyanophenylalanine to a (bacterial) ferredoxin that binds two [4Fe-4S] clusters? One might learn where the electron resides as most ferredoxins are considered one-electron redox mediators... 🧵

Sven T. Stripp@stripplab.bsky.social · last yr.

First off, let me highlight recent work from Vincent et al.: the authors modified plant ferredoxin with cyanophenylalanine and succeeded in measuring FeS-redox-dependent nitrile band shifts in the IR spectra.

Pleased to share my very general review of Photosynthesis now published in Nature Reviews Mol Cell Biol 🌞🌱 rdcu.be/em1lz Hopefully a useful primer for Postgrad and undergrad students

Structure, regulation and assembly of the photosynthetic electron transport chain

Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology - The electron transfer chain in chloroplast thylakoid membranes uses solar energy to produce NADPH and ATP, which power carbon fixation into biomass. This...

rdcu.be

Happy to present the lab latest work, today from the green-side. The ultimate PSII assembly intermediate that directly precedes incorporation of the Mn4O5Ca cluster and formation of the OEC. Psb32 binds to PsbV, challenging the assumption the extrinsic subunits all associate spontaneously in-vivo.

I know there are more important things to worry about right now... but it really pisses me off coming across things like this in the literature. Nominally 4.8 Å map... check out Fig S1 😬 (also check out any other #cryoem paper by same group, ~all in BBRC) www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Do you want to join the team? I just got awarded a 2 year fully funded Postdoc position to investigate the metabolism of anaerobic pathogenic bacteria. If you have a strong background in protein biochemistry or anaerobes shown by solid publications, reach out. Job add follows, please repost.