Don't be shy to take on a little two-week side project. These five months will be the most precious three years of your academic journey.

Proud to share the yeast telomerase structure, led by the talented @hongmiaohu.bsky.social in collaboration with the Wellinger and Chartrand labs. Discovered 37 years ago and took us nearly 7 years but totally worth the wait 😍. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFE4...

Cryo-EM structure of yeast telomerase

YouTube video by MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology

youtube.com

MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology@mrclmb.ac.uk · 4mo ago

Led by Investigator Scientist @hongmiaohu.bsky.social, @kellythd-nguyen.bsky.social’s group in the LMB’s Structural Studies Division have produced the first ever structure of telomerase from yeast. Read more here: mrclmb.ac.uk/news-events/... #LMBResearch #cryoEM 🧪

Curious about the origin of development during the transition to multicellularity? A very belated preprint alert: bit.ly/4rr2mHU Reproduction emerges from ecological interactions at the onset of multicellularity. A short 🧵 with lots of videos...

With Eugene Koonin, we propose a concept of “the selfish ribosome”, under which evolution of life is viewed as a ribosomal takeover, where the ribosome evolved to consume most of the cell’s resources, while other cellular componentry ensures the propagation of the ribosome. arxiv.org/abs/2602.23268

A portable orthogonal replication system enables continuous gene evolution near the biological speed limit https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.02.20.706958v1

Great summaries of our paper www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... in Science: www.science.org/doi/epdf/10.... and New Scientist: www.newscientist.com/article/2515... and in the Science museum blog: blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/in-the-begin...

A small polymerase ribozyme that can synthesize itself and its complementary strand

The emergence of a chemical system capable of self-replication and evolution is a critical event in the origin of life. RNA polymerase ribozymes can replicate RNA, but their large size and structural ...

science.org

Have a look at the Insight on Research story on our Science paper www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... on the @mrclmb.bsky.social website: mrclmb.ac.uk/news-events/... including a great little animation from LMB VisLab.

Bridging the gap from chemistry to life: discovery of a tiny RNA that can copy itself | MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology

Led by Edoardo Gianni, Philipp Holliger’s group in the LMB’s PNAC Division have identified a small self-replicating catalytic RNA (ribozyme), providing new ...

mrclmb.ac.uk

Thank you for the lovely & clear explanation of the work by @rogerhighfield.bsky.social @sciencemuseum.org.uk. Gives a bit of the behind-the-scenes of the research that led to this work!

Science Museum@sciencemuseum.org.uk · 6mo ago

Researchers have discovered a little RNA molecule - small enough to potentially form spontaneously, yet sophisticated enough to begin to copy itself - that could explain how life on Earth began over four billion years ago, Science Director @rogerhighfield.bsky.social reports: https://bit.ly/3ZvPS6s

Scientists have found a little RNA molecule – small enough to potentially form spontaneously, yet sophisticated enough to copy itself – that cd explain how life on Earth arose. Thanks @edogia.bsky.social of the @philholliger.bsky.social lab! blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/in-the-begin...

In the beginning - Science Museum Blog

A tiny self-copying molecule offers the clearest answer yet to the mystery of the origins of biology, reports Science Director Roger Highfield.

blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk

How did life arise from simple chemical building blocks? New #LMBResearch led by @edogia.bsky.social in @philholliger.bsky.social group has identified a small self-replicating ribozyme that could be the answer. Read more: mrclmb.ac.uk/news-events/...

New paper from my group in @science.org : "A small polymerase ribozyme that can synthesise itself and its complementary strand" www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... Outstanding work by @edogia.bsky.social

How could a simple self-replicating system emerge at the origins of life? RNA polymerase ribozymes can replicate RNA, but existing ones are so large that their self-replication seems impossible. Could they be smaller? Excited to share our latest work in @science.org on a new small polymerase. 1/n

A small polymerase ribozyme that can synthesize itself and its complementary strand

The emergence of a chemical system capable of self-replication and evolution is a critical event in the origin of life. RNA polymerase ribozymes can replicate RNA, but their large size and structural ...

science.org

RosettaFold 3 is here! 🧬🚀 AtomWorks (the foundational data pipeline powering it) is perhaps the really most exciting part of this release! Congratulations @simonmathis.bsky.social and team!!! ❤️ bioRxiv preprint: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

New paper from my group rdcu.be/eoaRr "Trinucleotide substrates under pH–freeze–thaw cycles enable open-ended exponential RNA replication by a polymerase ribozyme" in Nature Chemistry — great collaboration with attwaterlab.uk.

Trinucleotide substrates under pH–freeze–thaw cycles enable open-ended exponential RNA replication by a polymerase ribozyme

Nature Chemistry - Models of abiotic RNA replication suffer from inherent product inhibition arising from the high stability of RNA duplexes. Now, it has been shown that RNA trinucleotide...

rdcu.be

we recently found some really neat RNA-guided DNA-cutting systems in phages. Despite remarkable similarities to CRISPR systems, including encoding guide RNAs in arrays, they appear entirely evolutionarily distinct (but definitely related to snoRNAs 🤓) We decided to call them TIGR-Tas systems 🐯

RNAWorld xkcd.com/3002