Many thanks to Detlef's host @plantevolution.bsky.social. Our students from China Agricultural University had a great day 🎉🎉🎉 at MPI @mpi-bio-fml.bsky.social.

PlantEvolution 🌱🌾@plantevolution.bsky.social · 4d ago

Very happy to be able to host a student delegation from China Agricultural University led by my friend @wangshengzhu.bsky.social 🇩🇪🇨🇳 @mpi-bio-fml.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41... It's been a long time coming, but delighted to say that the first major output from my Royal Society Fellowship is now published. 🙂 #PlantScience

The post-fertilization archegonium gene network of seedless plants contributed to the origin of seeds - Nature Communications

The authors identify conserved gene networks across fern and angiosperm reproductive development, including between the sporophyte ovule and the fern gametophyte egg-chamber. Repurposing of this netwo...

nature.com

Ever had issues with contamination in #Marchantia or #liverwort tissue culture? We've developed a protocol that is simple and low-effort (albeit slow) to get rid of fungi and bacteria: dx.doi.org/10.17504/pro.... Work led by Isaac Coven and supported by Chetan Pandey, myself & @dromius.bsky.social.

Super useful! Keep your Marchantia clean everybody!

Darius Kosmützky@dariuskos.bsky.social · 5d ago

Ever had issues with contamination in #Marchantia or #liverwort tissue culture? We've developed a protocol that is simple and low-effort (albeit slow) to get rid of fungi and bacteria: dx.doi.org/10.17504/pro.... Work led by Isaac Coven and supported by Chetan Pandey, myself & @dromius.bsky.social.

Eerie similarity between NodeGWAS and our gfa2bin tool. Uses same public data (curated by my lab), same comparison against previous method from my lab & even same programming language, Rust. gfa2bin preprint went online 5 months before NodeGWAS was submitted. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

RA position working on Marchantia reproductive development in the Penfield group at JIC. Deadline is August 18th!

John Innes Centre@johninnescentre.bsky.social · 2d ago

VACANCY - We’re looking for a Research Assistant to join the Penfield Group, working to understand the effects of temperature on plant reproductive development. https://okt.to/Yx9K5e Deadline - 18 August 2026 Contract - Until 7 August 2029, full-time

Very happy to be able to host a student delegation from China Agricultural University led by my friend @wangshengzhu.bsky.social 🇩🇪🇨🇳 @mpi-bio-fml.bsky.social

Role of membrane-organizing SPFH proteins in plants: @hannah-web.bsky.social, Alexandra Ehinger, @birgitkemmerling.bsky.social et al define how Arabidopsis HIR2 forms higher-order assemblies and organizes receptor signaling domains link.springer.com/article/10.1...

The Arabidopsis SPFH protein HIR2 modulates receptor signaling and plasma membrane organization - The EMBO Journal

Plant plasma membrane proteins are organized into distinct domains; however, the principles that govern this spatial organization are not fully understood. HYPERSENSITIVE-INDUCED REACTION (HIR) protei...

link.springer.com

The receptor kinase NILR1 confers nematode resistance through developmental rather than canonical immune signaling www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

The receptor kinase NILR1 confers nematode resistance through developmental rather than canonical immune signaling

### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest.

biorxiv.org

Excited to share our recent paper in Nature Communications! 🎉 Using a 5-year Arabidopsis microbiome dataset, we combined machine learning with experimental validation to identify beneficial microbes that suppress the pathogen Albugo. www.nature.com/articles/s41... Congratulations to all of authors!

GreenRobust@greenrobust.de · last wk.

New GreenRobust publication by the group of Eric Kemen on using machine learning to identify beneficial microbiota: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Together with @plantophagy.bsky.social, we have an opened postdoc position for a young scientist that graduated after 01/01/2025, see ad attached

Excited to share our latest publication! 🎉 Here @sophiezoe.bsky.social reveals an early developmental time window determining initial growth direction of lateral roots. Wonderful collaboration with @wabniklab.bsky.social and @matesf.bsky.social lab www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... @cibss.bsky.social

SHOOT GRAVITROPISM 9 links sensory timing to the initial lateral root growth angle | PNAS

Plants strategically respond to gravity and actively set defined growth angles. These gravitropic set-point angles (GSAs) shape the width and depth...

pnas.org

If I were an Early Career Researcher (#ECR) today, I wouldn’t join a lab that doesn’t #preprint (the PI agreed to keep paying me until my paper is finally published). It now takes ages to get papers through peer review, and without preprints you’re putting your future in someone else’s hands.

Congratulations to @sheilaroitman.bsky.social, postdoctoral researcher in Detlef Weigel’s department @plantevolution.bsky.social, on receiving the Women’s Postdoctoral Career Development Award in Science from the Weizmann Institute! Her research explores how viruses shape plant microbiomes.

Career Development Award for Sheila Roitman

bio.mpg.de

@jigisha1.bsky.social @fmenardo.bsky.social et al. highlight the role of ecological isolation in preventing gene flow between triticale powdery mildew and its parental lineages. 🔗 doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evag172 #societyjournal #PlantSky

Tracking the Evolutionary Trajectory of a Young Hybrid Plant Pathogen

Abstract. A common mechanism by which emerging plant pathogens gain the ability to infect new hosts is hybridization. Despite its widespread occurrence, th

doi.org

📣 New preprint! 🧵 Fantastic work led by @antonkraege.bsky.social Fact: Cerato-platanins are everywhere in fungi. Found across the fungal kingdom, implicated in everything from development to virulence to immune activation. But what do they *actually* do? We finally found the answer 👇

New GreenRobust publication by the group of Eric Kemen on using machine learning to identify beneficial microbiota: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Machine learning reveals biocontrol agents shaping disease outcome in natural Arabidopsis populations - Nature Communications

Plants can recruit beneficial microbes to suppress pathogens, offering a route to rational biocontrol beyond empirical screening. Here, the authors use machine learning to identify disease-associated ...

nature.com

🚨 Call for the 2027 JXB Editorial Interns is now open! 🚨 🌱 Designed for ECRs, interns will gain behind-the-scenes publishing experience and write commentary pieces that will be published in the journal 📝 Deadline: 30 Sept 2026 👉 bit.ly/jxbinterns #PlantScience 🧪 SEBiology

How do transcription factors bind DNA strongly, and in a switch like manner, while remaining sequence specific? Our new paper on a canonical plant TF suggests the answer is a previously underappreciated assembly state: transcription factor nanoclusters. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Nanoclustering of a plant transcription factor enables strong yet specific DNA binding

Transcription factor nanoclusters balance the DNA binding trade-off between weakly binding oligomers and nonspecific condensates.

science.org

The receptor kinase NILR1 confers nematode resistance through developmental rather than canonical immune signaling https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.07.24.740501v1

It was great fun seeing our research featured both on national TV, the radio and in a news article this week! Check out how we are hopefully contributing to reducing CO2 emissions in the future. @ottlab.bsky.social

Thomas Ott@ottlab.bsky.social · 2w ago

Gestern Dreh, heute online. Ein kurzer Bericht über unsere Arbeit hier in Freiburg im Rahmen des @ensa-research.bsky.social Projekts und in Kooperation mit @cibss.bsky.social. Danke an @henrietteruebsam.bsky.social und das ganze Team für die Koordination und Mithilfe. www.swr.de/swraktuell/b...

"Programmable design of synthetic plant immune receptors for pathogen protein recognition" www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

1/5 Every paper has a story. Ours started with a dataset and ended with a conceptual advance. But what I'm most proud of is the development of the people behind it. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

SHOOT GRAVITROPISM 9 links sensory timing to the initial lateral root growth angle | PNAS

Plants strategically respond to gravity and actively set defined growth angles. These gravitropic set-point angles (GSAs) shape the width and depth...

pnas.org

Join my group at @fz_juelich within the @ceplas.bsky.social excellence cluster. #PlantJobs We’re looking for a postdoc/senior scientist in plant single-cell and spatial transcriptomics recruiting.fz-juelich.de/jobposting/8...

Postdoctoral Researcher / Senior Scientist in the field of plant single-cell and spatial transcriptomics

recruiting.fz-juelich.de

Please share! 🌱🤖 Permanent W2 Professorship in crop & plant sciences @ PhenoRob, University of Bonn. Especially encouraged: crop genome engineering, sustainable pest control, or sustainable disease control. Expertise in one area is enough. Apply by Sept. 30, 2026. www.uni-bonn.de/en/universit...

Out now! ➡️ Going viral – Plant selective autophagy swiping left and right on viral infections. We review how viruses and selective autophagy interact and propose that multiple parallel pathways collectively shape infection outcomes. Kudos to @jcmuede.bsky.social at @mpi-mp-potsdam.bsky.social.

Gestern Dreh, heute online. Ein kurzer Bericht über unsere Arbeit hier in Freiburg im Rahmen des @ensa-research.bsky.social Projekts und in Kooperation mit @cibss.bsky.social. Danke an @henrietteruebsam.bsky.social und das ganze Team für die Koordination und Mithilfe. www.swr.de/swraktuell/b...

Weniger Erdgas und CO2: Wissenschaftler forschen an Bakterien-Pflanzen-Symbiosen

Kunstdünger braucht viel Erdgas und schadet Klima und Gewässern. Forschende in Freiburg wollen, dass Nutzpflanzen sich mithilfe von Bakterien selbst mit Stickstoff versorgen.

swr.de

Happy to be at my first #ASPB meeting in Ottawa. If you’re interested in #evolution & phenolics in the closest algal relatives of land #plants, come to my poster #100-042 today from 5:30 pm to 6:15 pm and tomorrow (Monday) from 6:15 pm - 7:00 pm #PlantBio2026 #algae

Learn about the UV response of the earliest land plants #evolution of the phenylpropanoid pathway—& its divergence in zygnematophyte #algae at Cece's @caeciliafkunz.bsky.social poster 100-042 #PlantBio2026 @aspbofficial.bsky.social & checkout @currentbiology.bsky.social doi.org/10.1016/j.cu...

Excited to share the SNPstar! preprint! 🌿 SNPstar helps researchers explore how natural variation in Arabidopsis thaliana affects protein structure and function by integrating SNP data, AlphaFold3 models, stability predictions, population context, and more. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

SNPstar: A Web Server Linking Allelic Variation to Protein Structure and Function in Arabidopsis thaliana

Understanding how natural genetic variants affect protein structure and function is central to plant biology. The 1001 Genomes Project has catalogued millions of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs)...

biorxiv.org