Ekin Deniz Aksu
@ekindea.bsky.social
Scientist and medical doctor. Biology AI/ML methods, gene regulation, DNA sequence models, single cells. Doing a PhD in computational biology at @molgen.mpg.de.
"Here we describe a systematic effort (‘Codebook’) to determine the sequence specificity of 332 putative and poorly characterized human TFs." www.nature.com/articles/s41...
An expanded codebook of human transcription factor DNA-binding specificity - Nature
Results from a panel of assays that analyse different aspects of DNA sequence specificity reveal more than 100 new motifs to aid the characterization of putative human transcription factors.
nature.com
In a new study in Nature Communications, Martin Vingron and @ekindea.bsky.social present "Corgi", an AI-based tool that allows researchers to predict how the genome behaves across different cell types. Read more: www.molgen.mpg.de/news-2026-le... Original publication: doi.org/10.1038/s414...
1/ I'm excited to share that we're launching NECB 2026, the inaugural New England Computational Biology Symposium. Oct 1-2 at Microsoft Research New England, Cambridge. Two days of keynotes,talks, and posters to bring our community together across institutions.Space is limited. newenglandcompbio.org
I'm excited to share that Corgi is out in @natcomms.nature.com! We refine context-aware sequence-to-function models by using FiLM to condition the model on trans-regulator expression levels. This way Corgi can generalize to unseen cell types. www.nature.com/articles/s41... 🧵Thread 1/n
Context-aware sequence-to-function model of human gene regulation - Nature Communications
This study introduces Corgi and Corgi+ , biology-inspired deep neural network models of regulatory DNA sequences that can generalize to unseen cell types. They accurately impute epigenomic d...
nature.com
My first PhD paper is out in Nucleic Acids Research! We describe "Ab-trapping" - an antibody artifact that distorts assays relying on antibody diffusion (microscopy, CUT&Tag, CUT&RUN). The revisions made the story much stronger. Check it out! doi.org/10.1093/nar/...
Antibody-trapping presents a widespread pitfall for microscopy and genomics in the nucleus
Abstract. Chromatin has a complex 3D structure and diverse binding proteins that coordinate the genome’s most essential functions. Many microscopy and geno
doi.org
I have been thinking since yesterday about why I find the 1% thing so, so disturbing. It's a visceral reaction of 'just no', which goes beyond the general yuck towards the enshittification of/via AI. I have finally put my finger on it: it is the feeling you get when
(1/n) Very excited to share tri-lab collab (Mirny & Zechner) led by Harvey, Henrik & Jack: Q: How do enhancers & promoters interact in space (contact vs. action-at-a-distance) and time (stable vs. transient)? A: Transient E-P contact (~25-42 nm lasting ~10-20 sec): www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
A new Science study shows that bumble bees can position a ball underneath a fake “flower” to reach a reward, suggesting they can exhibit spontaneous problem-solving and challenging the notion that such advanced cognitive abilities are exclusive to large-brained vertebrates. https://scim.ag/4vs08dC
Exciting breakthrough technology from the lab, now live in @cellcellpress.bsky.social ! Instead of cutting the genome where proteins bind (e.g., Cut&Tag), D&D-seq scars the DNA with a deaminase, allowing single cell genome mapping of TFs and chromatin remodellers!
TL;DR: We've identified more than 100 cases of apparent manipulation in Thermo Fisher Scientific's antibody verification data. @sholtodavid.bsky.social @johanduchene.bsky.social reeserichardson.blog/2026/05/28/h...
How much of Thermo Fisher’s antibody data has been manipulated?
We’ve documented more than 100 instances of apparent data manipulation in Thermo’s catalog
reeserichardson.blog
I'm very happy to say that my first first-author paper has been published in Bioinf. Advances! 1/2 academic.oup.com/bioinformati...
🔬 Latest research in Bioinformatics Advances: "Modeling strategies for in vivo transcription factor binding predictions" Read it here: https://doi.org/10.1093/bioadv/vbag123 Authors include: @ekindea.bsky.social
Very excited to share our newest findings! A very long team effort pursued by multiple team members -to frantically reproduce everything over and over-, we show mTOR-Polycomb synergy at promoters of developmental master regulator TFs in ESCs prior to their expression. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
biorxiv.org
Does this mean the end of the central dogma?
Pujuan Poppy Deng@poppy-pujuan-deng.bsky.social · 4mo agoI am so excited to share our new findings with you! We provide the structural evidence for a direct protein-to-DNA information pathway, showing how a bacterial enzyme 'reads' its own structure to 'write' DNA. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
I am so excited to share our new findings with you! We provide the structural evidence for a direct protein-to-DNA information pathway, showing how a bacterial enzyme 'reads' its own structure to 'write' DNA. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Spectral multiplexing is typically limited to 4-5 channels. Our new preprint introduces a framework that utilizes DNA barcoding and signal tuning to enable robust spectral unmixing and ground-truth benchmarking to achieve 15-plex subcellular profiling without cycling www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Kristina@jekristina.bsky.social · 5mo agoEver felt constrained by the "4-color limit" in fluorescence imaging? We use DNA-barcoded labeling to build high-plex panels, enabling imaging of 15 targets across the full fluorescence spectrum. doi.org/10.64898/202... Grateful to @sinemsaka.bsky.social and all authors for making this possible.
🚨 Why can’t mammals regenerate limbs like frog tadpoles or salamanders? In our new paper in @science.org , we show that species-specific oxygen sensing acts as a gatekeeper for initiating limb regeneration 🐭🐸 🔗 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... #EvoDevo
Species-specific oxygen sensing governs the initiation of vertebrate limb regeneration
Why mammals cannot regenerate limbs like amphibians do presents a long-standing puzzle in biology. To uncover the underlying differences, we compared amputation responses of embryonic mouse (Mus musculus) and Xenopus laevis tadpole limbs. Lowering ...
science.org
MPRAs are the gold-standard tool for measuring how DNA sequences drive gene expression and prioritizing variant effects. In this preprint we asked: does it matter WHERE you place a variant in an MPRA? Spoiler: yes, and it might lead you to miss disease-causing variants. 1/6 doi.org/10.64898/202...
Position-dependent variant effects reveal importance of context in genomic regulation
Gene expression is governed by the DNA sequence, which is read out through complex interactions between transcription factors (TFs), co-activators, and chromatin. Massively Parallel Reporter Assays (MPRAs) provide a high-throughput framework for functionally characterizing how regulatory DNA sequences impact the expression of a model gene. MPRAs have also proven to be useful for measuring the effects of genetic variation, where each allele is typically tested in the center of ~200 bp of genomic context cloned into the MPRA, but the impact of variant position and local context remains largely unexplored. In this study, we systematically investigate how shifting the position of a variant within an MPRA probe influences its regulatory activity using models that predict expression in MPRAs from DNA sequence. We find that while the direction of variant effects is usually preserved across positions, the magnitude of expression changes can vary substantially depending on where the variant is placed within the construct. This positional bias appears to be largely explained by the strong position-dependent activity of TFs whose binding the variants perturb. In a subset of cases, interactions consistent with cooperativity between TFs also contribute to position-specific effects. ~1% of variants appear to disrupt RNA polymerase III (Pol III) promoters within Alu elements, resulting in position-specificity because both A and B boxes are required for function and exclusion of either motif due to window shifts disrupts the variants' effects. However, we saw little evidence to support the hypothesis that the positional dependence of variant effects resulted from the redundancy of motifs. Overall, our study demonstrates the complexity of cis-regulatory grammar and how it can confound the interpretation of regulatory variants. ### Competing Interest Statement R.T. has filed intellectual property related to MPRA and MPRA models. The other authors declare no competing interests.
biorxiv.org
Ever wondered how a eukaryotic transcription factor finds its specific DNA motif in the vast genome? In this preprint, we directly measured the dynamics of this search process in living cells, revealing a cooperative mechanism mediated by disordered regions. 1/10 doi.org/10.64898/202...
doi.org
New OpenFold3 preview out! (OF3p2) It closes the gap to AlphaFold3 for most modalities. Most critically, we're releasing everything, including training sets & configs, making OF3p2 the only current AF3-based model that is functionally trainable & reproducible from scratch🧵1/9
🧬 How do immune disease-relevant variants affect gene regulatory networks in CD4+ T cells? 🧪🖥️ We coupled two large-scale CRISPRi screens (>4M cells) to map the downstream cascades of thousands of SNPs More details in the thread below 👇 or in the article 📖 on biorxiv tinyurl.com/CD4screens
Some molecular machines, like ribosomes, can persist for long periods of time in cells. Could molecular aging of ribosomes shape how proteins are made? In our new preprint we track ribosomes as they age in cells and uncover unexpected effects on translation (1/10) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
New online! Gene regulatory networks: from correlative models to causal explanations
Gene regulatory networks: from correlative models to causal explanations
Nature Reviews Genetics, Published online: 09 March 2026; doi:10.1038/s41576-026-00939-1In this Perspective, Maizels and Briscoe discuss the limitations of current models of gene regulatory networks and outline solutions to harness data abundance without compromising explanatory power.
dlvr.it
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... This is clever, very clever
Single intramuscular injection of self-amplifying RNA of Nppa to treat myocardial infarction
Self-amplifying RNA (saRNA) enables sustained protein expression from a single administration. In this study, we developed an intramuscular saRNA-lipid nanoparticle (saNppa-LNP) therapy encoding natri...
science.org
We wrote a perspective "How to build the regulatory genome: a constructionist guide to the cis-regulatory code", out in Development yesterday. Title says it all. Find it here: journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...
Our most recent work on the “function and evolution” of #nuclear-speckles is now online at Cell @cp-cell.bsky.social doi.org/10.1016/j.ce... Read the thread👇 for the highlights of our findings.
Redirecting
doi.org
Ooooh. Cool new paper on origins of life. A simple 45-nucleotide RNA molecule that can perfectly copy itself. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
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
Exciting Postdoc Opportunities – Alliance Interinstitutional Program **Deadline:** March 31, 2026 (5:00 pm CEST) 🔗 Two shared positions: www.syn-gen.de/alliance-pos... 🔗 Full call & application info:: www.health-life-sciences.de/opportunitie...
HEALTH + LIFE SCIENCE ALLIANCE | Interinstitutional Postdocs
health-life-sciences.de
