How many TFs to you need to open chromatin at enhancers? Very excited to see this one out! Check out the augmented version with combinatorial motif mutant libraries in Figure 5! Very proud of @guidobarzaghi.bsky.social @valentinabaderna.bsky.social @embl.org

Guido Barzaghi@guidobarzaghi.bsky.social · 2mo ago

📄 That's a wrap 📄 we're excited to share that the latest from @arnaudkr.bsky.social 's lab and Judith Zaugg's lab is at last online at doi.org/10.1038/s415.... Many thanks to my co-first @valentinabaderna.bsky.social and to @embl.org for the wonderful research environment.

Our preprint is now out in @natgenet.nature.com ! doi.org/10.1038/s415... We measured Sox2 promoter bursting dynamics with the SCR enhancer positioned at different distances within a genomic locus devoid of confounding effects in mESC: Main findings in the 🧵 below:

Enhancer control of promoter activity and variability via frequency modulation of clustered transcriptional bursts - Nature Genetics

Tünnermann et al. use live-cell imaging to study promoter activity under the control of an enhancer inserted at different genomic distances. RNA production from the promoter occurs in clusters of tran...

doi.org

Luca Giorgetti lab @FMI@lucagiorgetti.bsky.social · 2y ago

Celebrating 10 years of our lab with a new preprint: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... How does enhancer location within a TAD control transcriptional bursts from a cognate promoter? Experiments by Jana Tünnermann and modelling by Gregory Roth

Best news on such a hot day! Congratulations @au-ho-yu.bsky.social and @robklose.bsky.social - an amazing achievement! Alan has done an amazing job and is currently working hard to address the reviewers' concerns! Comments came took 4 months to come back - reviewer 2 doesn't agree with g.e.d!

QED Science@qedscience.bsky.social · 4mo ago

🎉 Meet The 1%. Out of 57,455 bioRxiv life science preprints, QED Science selected 574 exceptional manuscripts through blind evaluation. The 1%: the-one-percent.qedscience.com Good science deserves to be seen. @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social @openrxiv.bsky.social @richardsever.bsky.social

"the first validated, large-scale framework for judging the quality of life science papers independently of venue, identity, and prestige...Blinded domain-expert professors sided with score three times more often than with journal rank" the-one-percent.qedscience.com 1/n

In addition to being an excellent scientist, @aleksszczurek.bsky.social is an extremely talented watercolour artist. I've finally got this beautiful painting back from the framer and up on the wall in pride of place! The scene is from a photo I took on a rather changeable day in Glenmalure, Ireland.

Although cohesin-sensitive, long-range enhancer activation is equivalent in nature to proximal activation. Cooperativity can arise from different levels of activation inputs operating on a non-linear response function. @eliasfriman.bsky.social @uoe-igc.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

We’re pleased to share that Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz has been named as the government’s preferred candidate for Chair of UKRI. Sir Leszek is expected to take up the role later this summer and will succeed the current UKRI Chair, Sir Andrew Mackenzie. More: www.ukri.org/news/sir-les...

Sir Leszek Borysiewicz named as preferred candidate for UKRI Chair

Science and Technology Secretary Liz Kendall has named Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz as the government’s preferred candidate for Chair of UKRI.

ukri.org

Monthly median Received to Accepted time (days) at Nature Genetics

Do we grow wiser as we age? I spent 15+ years chasing glam journals, wasting time and energy (and frustrating my team and co-authors). I don’t want to wake up at 70 and realize my life went into convincing a few editors my work was trendy enough. Enough. I’ll try to be smarter.

Our man Alan speaking about his latest story! Make sure to join

FragileNucleosome@fnucleosome.bsky.social · 9mo ago

🥁 #FragileNucleosome is back on Jan 28! We are very excited to host @au-ho-yu.bsky.social and @gcloner.bsky.social as our first speakers of 2026! 📋Please don't forget to register for our 2026 seminar series: us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

Using degron technology to systematically deplete all SET1/MLL complexes, we find that they synergise to deposit H3K4me3 at gene promoters. Using mass spectrometry (thanks to Inge de Krijger and Michiel Vermeulen), we also identify a novel SET1B isoform that contributes substantially to H3K4me3.

Excited to share our new preprint from the Klose lab, where we investigate how SET1/MLL complexes shape H3K4me3 and regulate transcription in mouse ES cells. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

SET1/MLL complexes control transcription independently of H3K4me3

Histone H3 lysine 4 trimethylation (H3K4me3) at gene promoters is thought to play a central role in gene transcription. H3K4 methylation is deposited by the SET1 (A/B) and MLL (1-4) multi-protein comp...

biorxiv.org

Also @au-ho-yu.bsky.social probably holds the world record for the most degron-tagged proteins in the same line. Guess how many!

Emilia Dimitrova@edimitrova.bsky.social · 10mo ago

Excited to see the latest from the Klose lab out this morning! Our brilliant PhD student Alan, now Dr Au, has dissected how SET1/MLL complexes shape H3K4me3 and shows they regulate transcription independently of their cat activity. He teamed up with Aleks to explore how. A few surprises!

An early Christmas present for those interested in chromatin and transcription! Fantastic work from @au-ho-yu.bsky.social and @aleksszczurek.bsky.social . Thanks to Inge and Michiel for their help. Please repost! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

SET1/MLL complexes control transcription independently of H3K4me3

Histone H3 lysine 4 trimethylation (H3K4me3) at gene promoters is thought to play a central role in gene transcription. H3K4 methylation is deposited by the SET1 (A/B) and MLL (1-4) multi-protein comp...

biorxiv.org

ERC starter grant applications from US researchers nearly triple in 2025 compared to 2024 as Trump restricts funding. Good for "Choose Europe" initiatives, but dire for global and national science, given the limited volume of non-US funding available.

Trump’s university backlash drives US researchers towards Europe

EU grant applications hit record in 2025 amid surge in interest from American academics

ft.com

A new, nerdy paper. We figured out (some) of the rules underlying cell-permeability of probes and designed ligands that light up, grab, and move proteins around. Awesome @hhmijanelia.bsky.social x @uwmadison.bsky.social x @stjuderesearch.bsky.social collaboration! www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

🧬 New preprint! SNU-Seq maps nascent transcription at single-nucleotide resolution using 4sU labeling. Together with sf4sU-Seq, it shows how epigenetically primed chromatin rapidly activates transcription after IFN-γ. 📄 doi.org/10.1101/2021... #SNUSeq #RNAseq

Single Nucleotide Resolution 4sU Sequencing (SNU-Seq) reveals the transcriptional responsiveness of an epigenetically primed human genome

Genomes are pervasively transcribed, leading to stable and unstable transcripts that influence 3-dimensional genome organisation and gene regulation. High sensitivity and nucleotide resolution are req...

doi.org

I’m a fair-weather poster on here to say the least. However, I'm pleased to present our latest paper. A great effort from all authors and an interesting insight into transcriptional regulation (we think!). www.cell.com/molecular-ce...

Sequential verification of transcription by Integrator and Restrictor

Estell and Łazowski et al. show that Integrator and Restrictor form distinct pathways for early attenuation of RNA polymerase II: Integrator acts at the promoter-proximal pause site, whereas Restricto...

cell.com

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT📣: I haven’t been this excited to be part of something new in 15 years… Thrilled to reveal the passion project I’ve been working on for the past year and a half!🙀🥳 (thread 👇)

If you are a computational biologist come, apply and join Howard & Klose lab in a joint Norwich-Oxford collaboration on chromatin dynamics!

John Innes Centre@johninnescentre.bsky.social · last yr.

VACANCY - We have an opportunity for a Postdoctoral Researcher to join the Howard Group, working to develop computational models of epigenetic dynamics in the Polycomb system. www.jic.ac.uk/vacancies/po... Closing date - 9 November 2025 Salary - £37,500 - £45,350 Contract - 36 months, full-time

If you are a computational biologist interested in how chromatin states are established and maintained to regulate transcription, this is the dream job for you! This will be in close collaboration with the Klose lab in Oxford and we have a lot of cool projects you can get involved in. Apply!

John Innes Centre@johninnescentre.bsky.social · last yr.

VACANCY - We have an opportunity for a Postdoctoral Researcher to join the Howard Group, working to develop computational models of epigenetic dynamics in the Polycomb system. www.jic.ac.uk/vacancies/po... Closing date - 9 November 2025 Salary - £37,500 - £45,350 Contract - 36 months, full-time

Happy Pluripotency Day! #Oct4

Delighted to share our lab's first preprint identifying DDIAS as a mitotic DNA repair protein. Great collaboration with the @andrewblackford.bsky.social, @tcr-miller.bsky.social and @profstewartlab.bsky.social labs, and many more. Read the paper here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

DDIAS is a single-stranded DNA-binding effector of the TOPBP1-CIP2A complex in mitosis

DNA double-strand breaks and unresolved DNA replication intermediates are particularly dangerous during mitosis. Paradoxically, cells inactivate canonical DNA repair mechanisms during chromosome segre...

biorxiv.org

Double celebration on our floor @oxfordbiochemistry.bsky.social with @guifengwei.bsky.social from the Brockdorff lab and Dounia and Sherry from Fisher lab having their papers published today! And I hear there is more to come... www.nature.com/articles/s41... www.nature.com/articles/s41...

m6A and the NEXT complex direct Xist RNA turnover and X-inactivation dynamics - Nature Structural & Molecular Biology

Wei et al. show that the primary function of m6A on the nuclear long noncoding RNA Xist, a master regulator of X inactivation, is to promote RNA degradation. Xist turnover is mediated by the nuclear e...

nature.com

Do you know where transcription of a gene actually stops? Hint: it is not the annotated gene end. In our new paper in Nucleic Acids Research we argue that phosphorylation on threonine 4 of RNA Pol II CTD is a marker of transcription termination in animals... 🧵 academic.oup.com/nar/advance-...

Check out our new collaborative preprint about Affinity-ligand purification of native human low-abundance multi-protein complexes doi.org/10.1101/2025...

Affinity-ligand purification of native human low-abundance multi-protein complexes for structure determination

In human cells, large multi-protein transcription co-activators, such as chromatin remodelers or histone acetyltransferases, play critical roles in gene-expression regulation and are often implicated ...

doi.org

Registration for Transcription and Chromatin UK is OPEN! Taking place from September 17 to 19, 2025, this conference will showcase cutting-edge research and is a ‘must-attend’ event for the UK transcription and chromatin community & both at home and abroad. Pl register ow.ly/7QQb50W9Alo & share

Fresh preprint by @flavia-con.bsky.social from our lab uncovers how SMCHD1 finds & binds chromatin using live-cell single-molecule imaging🔬 She reveals how SMCHD1 dynamically engages chromatin, including the inactive X chromosome, to maintain gene silencing. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Selective interaction of the protein SMCHD1 with specific chromatin regions is governed by the loading factor LRIF1 and SMCHD1 ATPase activity

The chromosomal protein SMCHD1 is a GHKL ATPase that plays important roles in epigenetic silencing, including on the inactive X chromosome (Xi) and at the D4Z4 macrosatellite linked to regulation of D...

biorxiv.org

Check out new paper on single-molecule live-cell imaging of SMCHD1 binding to an inactive X chromosome by Flavia Constantinescu from Neil Brockdorff's team! :)

Also noted: The first two blastomeres contribute unequally to the human embryo. www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...

The first two blastomeres contribute unequally to the human embryo

Labeling and live imaging of human embryos reveal that the majority of the future body originates, mostly, from one of the 2-cell stage blastomeres. Descendants of the first 2-cell stage blastomere to...

cell.com