What should the future of condensate research look like? Great to see this new Roadmap for Condensates in Cell Biology, shaped by discussions at KITP and with contributions from our own @ivarhaugerud.bsky.social. Congrats to @zwickergroup.bsky.social and everyone involved! 🎉

Zwicker Group@zwickergroup.bsky.social · last mo.

Our "Roadmap for Condensates in Cell Biology" (doi.org/10.1103/3b2k...) has finally been published PRX Life! 🎉 This forward-looking article summarizes amazing discussions of an interdisciplinary group of scientists at @kitp-ucsb.bsky.social last year.

🚨 New preprint! From protein & RNA condensates to synthetic coacervates and DNA nanostars, vacuoles (dilute pockets inside droplets) show up everywhere. 🫧 We explain when and why they form. 🔬🧫 📄 arxiv.org/abs/2607.25743 w/ @boekhovenlab.bsky.social sky.social @kgoepfrich.bsky.social

Given the heat these past weeks, we've recently been moving our group meetings outside to profit from nature's natural cooling systems. 🌬️💨

@advait-thatte.bsky.social recently got back from the International Soft Matter Conference 2026 (25th -29th May) in Goa, India where he presented a poster on 'Gravitationally induced oscillations of active droplets'. 💧🧪 Many thanks to the organisers! @ismc2026.bsky.social

🎉 Our paper "Harvesting chemical power from cyclic environments" is out in PRR! We show how cyclic environments can drive chemical reactions away from equilibrium to harvest chemical power, possibly kickstarting life's origin? 🧬⚡ w/ @m-pol.bsky.social journals.aps.org/prresearch/a...

A big thanks and congratulations to the organisational team for yet another amazing MOM conference. 🔬 Was a great chance to meet so many amazing scientists from all around the world working on the Molecular Origins of Life. 🧬

CRC 392 - Molecular Evolution in Prebiotic Environments@crc392molevo.bsky.social · 6mo ago

Life didn’t start in a single discipline, and neither does this conference. 🌍 Molecular Origins of Life Munich 2026 (MOM) unites astronomy, biochemistry, geoscience, theoretical chemistry, and physics to explore how life emerged from non-living matter. 🤝 In-person | 🎟️ Free (1/3)

Excited to share our new PRL on excitable active droplets 🎉 We show that droplets maintained far from equilibrium behave as an excitable system and can undergo self-sustained cycles of formation and dissolution 🔥 Link: doi.org/10.1103/g9dh... w/ @m-pol.bsky.social @boekhovenlab.bsky.social

@pranayjaiswal.bsky.social @advait-thatte.bsky.social Back from @apsphysics.bsky.social this year. Was a super dynamic and fruitful conference, APS Global Physics Summit being the largest physics research conference in the world, meeting former collaborates and discussing potential collaborations. 👨‍🔬

Continuing with our yearly tradition of our Physics Faculty Football Tournament at the University of Augsburg last week. Even with many players from the group out from being sick, was still a really fun day for the faculty, and one we always look forward to. ⚽⚛️

Was a great week at DPG in Dresden this year! Was a pleasure to share our work with several talks and poster sessions, and was super exciting connecting with physicists working on many interesting topics. A big thank you to the @dfg.de @sfp-physique.bsky.social for the organisation this year. 👨‍🔬👩‍🔬

Was great to be at the International Workshop from the 16 - 20 February, discussing topics that range "From Adaptive to Active Wetting Dynamics". It was an amazing interdisciplinary workshop and a big thank you to all the organisers and the participants for fruitful discussions. @mpipks.bsky.social

Congrats to Dr. @ivarhaugerud.bsky.social who just defended his PhD AND published in PNAS his work studying how droplets influence polymerization of sequences, while, in turn, sequence polymerization affects droplet dynamics! With @m-pol.bsky.social + Dieter Braun www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

We are very proud of Dr. Ivar Haugerud for successfully defending his PhD thesis at the University of Augsburg in December 2025. We wish him all the best in his post-doc position back in Oslo with Prof. Andreas Carlson at the University of Oslo. @uio.no 🥂🍾🎉

Ivar S. Haugerud@ivarhaugerud.bsky.social · 8mo ago

Very happy to have passed my PhD defence 🎓 Huge thanks to my supervisor, @m-pol.bsky.social, the committee, colleagues, collaborators, and everyone I’ve met over the last four years who made the journey possible ❤️🙏

Active droplets are fundamental in cell biology and origin of life. With Jonathan Bauermann, @boekhovenlab.bsky.social, Frank Jülicher, and @m-pol.bsky.social, we show that a critical transition influences their size, morphology, ripening and division propensity journals.aps.org/prx/abstract...

Can prebiotic chemistry harvest energy from cyclic environments? We explore how oscillating reservoirs can drive chemical systems to extract power. Revealing resonance regimes for optimal harvest. 🔗 arxiv.org/abs/2510.10266 @pranayjaiswal.bsky.social, @ivarhaugerud.bsky.social and Hidde D. Vuijk.

The CECAM workshop “Multiscale modeling of chemically active mixtures” was a fruitful and stimulating meeting — combining deep discussions, new collaborations, and inspiring science. Thanks to beautiful Lausanne for providing the perfect backdrop! 🇨🇭🏔️ @cecamevents.bsky.social

New pre-print with Jacqueline Janssen and Frank Jülicher! We extend the Lifshitz-Slyozov-Wagner (LSW) theory by matter supply, and find a novel universal law governing coarsening kinetics, valid for any constant matter supply in the interface-resistance-limited regime. 📄: arxiv.org/abs/2510.21552

'Liquid shells: A peculiar state': Will be visiting the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organisation for a Colloquium, discussing the formation of liquid shells using non-equilibrium thermodynamics. Feel free to drop by or join online. 💧🐚 www.ds.mpg.de/events/41316...

Very much looking forward to the second edition of the ICTP-SAIFR thematic series of schools on biological physics across scales, in Sao Paulo, Brazil. More information and applications: www.ictp-saifr.org/sbpas2026/

Great days at Frontiers in Nanoscience with @cens-lmu.bsky.social & @crc392molevo.bsky.social! Met new people, reconnected with old collaborators, and enjoyed inspiring talks, posters, and discussions. Hard to beat doing science with a view of Venice from the international university at San Servolo!

Good news in rough times: Our work on generalising Lifshitz-Slyosov-Wagner (LSW) theory to active systems, led by the all-mighty Jonathan Bauermann, is out on PRL!! Special thanks to Christoph Weber @m-pol.bsky.social and Frank Jülicher. doi-org.sire.ub.edu/10.1103/f5x9...

Another pre-print from our group see's the light of day! 🎉 This time we how the coarsening of droplets is affected by advection and reactions: arxiv.org/abs/2510.00827 @stefankoestler2025.bsky.social describes our surprising findings in the thread below ⤵️

Advection selects pattern in multi-stable emulsions of active droplets

Controlling the size of droplets, for example in biological cells, is challenging because large droplets typically outcompete smaller droplets due to surface tension. This coarsening is generally acce...

arxiv.org

Stefan Köstler@stefankoestler2025.bsky.social · 12mo ago

New preprint 🥳 In our new paper, we show that “Advection selects pattern in multi-stable emulsions of active droplets” — which provides a path toward controlling regular arrangements of droplets. 🧵 📄 arxiv.org/abs/2510.00827

Thanks to the @spp2191.bsky.social and @gbmev.bsky.social for the amazing organisation of the "GBM Compact: Focus on Condensate Biology" Conference and the SPP2191 Satellite Meeting. 🧬💧

Great to see the role of phase separation in the culinary world being recognised. 🧀🍝 A huge congratulations to @gbart.bsky.social and collaborators!

Giacomo Bartolucci (he)@gbart.bsky.social · last yr.

Still can't believe this: WE WON THE IG NOBEL PHYSICS PRIZE www.washingtonpost.com/science/2025...

Looking back on the "Emergence and Self-organisation in Biological Systems" conference last month @esbs2025.bsky.social, celebrating the contributions of Prof. Erwin Frey @physicsoflifelmu.bsky.social to the field (and his birthday 🎂). Was a great conference, catching up with lots of familiar faces.

Was super fun to host the Michaels Group from ETH for a collaborative visit last week. 🤝 As a coincidental bonus, we celebrated the Autumn Augsburg Plärrer Folkfestival together with lots of laughs, drinks and great discussions. 🍻

A sneak peak into our yearly summer group retreat with the Comp. Bio Group of Prof. Nadine Schwierz and the Stat. Physics of Life Group of Prof. Abhinav Sharma in Sion, Switzerland. Was a great chance to spend time in nature, and to share and discuss exciting new collaborations. ☀️⛰️🫕

Excited to share our new JACS paper "Controlling Multiphase Coacervate Wetting and Self‑Organization by Interfacial Proteins" Together with our fantastic collaborators @spruijtlab.bsky.social l we show how surface-active proteins tune condensate architecture and organization.

Controlling Multiphase Coacervate Wetting and Self-Organization by Interfacial Proteins

Biomolecular condensates help organize biochemical processes in cells and synthetic cell analogues. Many condensates exhibit multiphase architectures, yielding compartments with distinct functions. Ho...

pubs.acs.org

David @zwickergroup.bsky.social gives the first tutorial of the biomol25 program @kitp-ucsb.bsky.social, reminding us that phase equilibria and chemical equilibria are coupled by thermodynamics

Shura Grosberg (NYU) gives a fantastic blackboard talk @kitp-ucsb.bsky.social on liquid-liquid phase separation in and out of equilibrium 👨‍🏫