Do you work in #cancer and feel behind-the-curve in #CRISPR state of the art? Get up to speed fast with this review! Huge kudos to Joshua Casan, Samuel Grigg, and Carolyn Shembrey for heavy lifting to pull this together. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

CRISPR in clinical oncology: translational advances from molecular diagnostics to therapeutics - Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology

CRISPR–Cas technologies provide a modular, programmable platform for sequence-specific targeting of DNA or RNA and have advanced from experimental molecular biology tools to clinical translation. This...

nature.com

Do you need a super active #CRISPR Cas for in vivo editing? I have not one, but two options for you. Activities rival SpyCas9, but they fit into an scAAV. Check out our latest paper, co-led by Fedor Gorbenko and Irene Sala. Just out in Genome Research. link.springer.com/article/10.1...

I'm very excited to be part of the new #NCCR Children & Cancer. This amazing group spans all of #Switzerland to unite researchers & clinical practitioners to tackle deadly childhood cancers. Website is live today - stay tuned for #hiring and research updates childrenandcancer.ch

New lab preprint - Common and rare variant studies for the same trait identify different genes and here Diederik Laman Trip developed a protein network AI enconding to investigate if traits studied by different approaches converge on the same molecular pathways www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

The preliminary program and registration is open for SwissPR 2026, happening in Basel at the Biozentrum on 30th June. Hear from @jpkbravo.bsky.social , Jonathan Schmid-Burgk, Julian Grünewald, @martinpacesa.bsky.social, and more. Register now at www.swisspr-symposium.uzh.ch/en.html

Excited to share our discovery of a new programmable RNA-guided DNA-targeting system hiding inside bacteriophages that predates CRISPR. We call it VIPR (Viral Interference Programmable Repeat), and it uses an entirely new logic to find its targets. Thread + link below.

Proper organelle regulation during mitosis is a must, but how do membrane-less condensates like PML bodies behave during cell division? In work led by Eric Aird, we found the balance of speckled proteins SP110 & SP100 to be the key. doi.org/10.1038/s415...

The E3 ubiquitin ligase mechanism specifying target-directed microRNA degradation (TDMD) is now published! 🎉🍾 We, @bartellab.bsky.social and Schulman lab, describe how 2-RNA factors control protein degradation by recruiting an E3 ligase. @mpibiochem.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Many genome-editing tools work by cutting DNA - but the shape of the cut matters. Using genome-wide screening, we show ERCC6L2 is specifically required to maintain repair fidelity at staggered DNA breaks, but not at blunt ends. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

It’s been a fun first few week of my sabbatical. Many exciting meetings w/ @peterfineran.bsky.social lab, learning new stuff and brainstorming ideas. And my own lab has been off to a crazy great start to the year. The early/late zoom meetings have me burning the candle at both ends…

Dunedin welcomed me to my sabbatical at @universityofotago.bsky.social with @peterfineran.bsky.social with style.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

AI reviewers are here — we are not ready

Artificial intelligence promises rapid and polite feedback on papers — but we must first review the reviewer.

nature.com

Sometimes I'm excited to read a paper and every paragraph blows me away. And sometimes I'm just as excited and every paragraph leaves me wondering if the referees were sleeping on the job. Today it was one of the latter.

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ALT: a bald man in a plaid shirt and vest

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ERC Plus Grants • No career limit, current ERCs are not eligible • Major challenge, transformative research • Up to 7 million euros, up to 7 years • 30 grants per year, 2 years, only once per lifetime • Same application format, plus vision statement • Deadline in September 2026, 2 stage evaluation

Pedro Beltrao@pedrobeltrao.bsky.social · 8mo ago

Webinar on the new ERC Plus Grants live starting now www.youtube.com/live/Dzkas7f...

What controls expansion & contraction of DNA repeats (e.g. Huntington's)? We were thrilled to collaborate w/ the lab of Marta Olejniczak to find out. Check out the cool screen from @sebasiegner.bsky.social and @matthiasmuhar.bsky.social that reads out repeat sequence. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

I’m very grateful to @ethz.ch @vseth.ethz.ch.web.brid.gy for a Golden Owl award. People who know me know that I respectfully decline science awards. But recognition directly by students hits different!

Congratulations to @sebasiegner.bsky.social who defended his PhD on Friday! His name will be on 6-7 papers by the time he leaves the lab, including a co-first Nature paper. What a superstar! Keep an eye out for his postdoc application 😉

I recently received an AI-generated referee report. Almost all suggested experiments were already main figures & referee admitted using AI when asked by the editor. But they claimed they only used AI to write. No way. Editors, what do you do in this case? Referees, at least read the paper!

It has been disappointing to see the general lack of interest and investment into population genetics and genomic medicine in Switzerland. While we can resort to other national cohorts for research the country can only benefit if the know-how can be applied locally www.sfa-phrt.ch/success-stor...

Didier Trono Interview “Switzerlands Genetic Diversity is Unique” - PHRT – Personalized Health & Related Technologies

Success Story Didier Trono While other countries are pressing ahead with the Genome of Europe, Switzerland is still hesitating. A huge mistake, says Didier Trono from the Genome Center in Geneva “I do...

sfa-phrt.ch

957 proposals were submitted in the latest round of ERC Synergy applications. They expect to fund 50 which means around 5% success rate. This is really not sustainable and a lot of people are likely avoiding doing this knowing how poor the chances are. erc.europa.eu/news-events/...

Applications for ERC Synergy Grants 2026: Facts and figures

The ERC Synergy Grants 2026 call closed for applications on 5 November 2025. These are the preliminary data on the submitted proposals:

erc.europa.eu

Congrats to Moritz Schlapansky, who successfully defended his PhD thesis on Friday! You can read his work on "scOUT-seq" profiling of single cell transcriptomes + editing outcomes in millions of cells and living mice at www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

In 2026 I'm taking a sabbatical in @peterfineran.bsky.social lab @universityofotago.bsky.social. I'm looking forward to learning a lot from Peter's lab and excited to get back to my prokaryotic/viral roots! Also planning to some trips to the rest of the Pacific and Asia. So much to look forward to!

Sometimes #Cas9 is too dang big. But mini Cas proteins are bad at both NHEJ & HDR. PhD student Fedor Gorbenko used mammalian cell evolution for *HDR* to make REALLY super #Cas12f1 and #TnpB. As good as or better than Cas9! Base editors included! www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/short/2025.10.27.684765v1

Directed evolution of compact RNA-guided nucleases for homology-directed repair in mammalian cells

RNA-guided nucleases enable DNA editing and offer promise for treating genetic diseases, particularly when used for precise sequence replacement. However, many of the most effective enzymes, such as S...

biorxiv.org

Thanks to CRISPR/Cas technology, researchers can precisely edit genetic material to treat hereditary diseases. To achieve this, they need to identify undesirable cuts in the genome at an early juncture. Pioneer Fellow Lilly van de Venn is developing such testing methods. ethz.ch/en/news-and-...

An ETH spin-off aims to bring gene scissors to the clinic

Thanks to CRISPR/Cas technology, researchers can precisely edit genetic material to treat hereditary diseases. To achieve this, they need to identify undesirable cuts in the genome at an early junctur...

ethz.ch

Ever noticed that #CRISPR editing results differ between cells? Awesome PhD student Moritz Schlapansky developed "scOUT-seq" to measure single cell transcriptomes + editing. 1.2 million cells, 74 cell types, living 🐭. Cell subtypes differ wildly from bulk average! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Cell-stereotyped DNA repair outcomes are widespread during genome editing

Genome editing outcomes are governed by DNA repair pathways that vary with cell type and state. We developed scOUT-seq (single-cell Outcomes Using Transcript sequencing), a scalable approach that join...

biorxiv.org

Long time no see, everyone! Things have been a bit more busy than ususal, hence the radio silence. But stay tuned for some fun news in the next few days.

Excited to share our latest preprint. Work led by PhD student @jordancjwilson.bsky.social with @profmarciniak.bsky.social, @villungerlab.bsky.social & our @erc.europa.eu partners @jcornlab.bsky.social & @loizoulab.bsky.social, that sheds light on the action of WEE1 inhibitors. bit.ly/4bDpxZl

Do you want to know about the invisible secrets of #HDR during #CRISPR genome editing? Check out our preprint at www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1.... New methods, crazy biology, and theft from the genome! From PhD student @charlesyeh.bsky.social

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ALT: a man wearing an orange jacket with the number 22573 on it holds a candy bar

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New #preprint from the lab! Do you want to see the invisible? So did we! When DNA genomes get broken, cells somehow find related sequences to fix the break. But how do they find it? We developed a way to look at sequence *search*, not just sequence usage. doi.org/10.1101/2025...

Cells are filled with toxic stuff that damages healthy proteins. Is that garbage just left to rot on the curb? No way! Ubiquitin ligases have evolved to recognize chemical damage and clean it up! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

C-terminal amides mark proteins for degradation via SCF–FBXO31 - Nature

SCF–FBXO31 scans proteins for C-terminal amidation and marks them for subsequent proteasomal degradation.

nature.com