New preprint from @s-gauthier.bsky.social and @charlesrleveillee.bsky.social in collaboration with the labs of Xuifang Xin, @gittacoaker.bsky.social and Laurent Noël Water immunity: Yesterday's preprint: Dampness is a DAMP... today's: ...but it also dampens defense www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Extracellular water withdrawal drives disease resistance in the phyllosphere

A central question in immunity is how hosts arrest pathogen growth. Diverse plant pathogens create a water-soaked niche in host tissue essential for pathogenesis, yet how water shapes infection outcom...

biorxiv.org

Charles Roussin-Léveillée@charlesrleveillee.bsky.social · 2w ago

Myth busted: immune activation ≠ immunity 🌱⚔️. We found ETI can trigger full cell death without stopping bacterial growth - if water stays in the apoplast. Want to know what immunity is from a physiological standpoint? 👇 A thread🧵

📣 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 👇

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

Our work is now online @cp-cellhostmicrobe.bsky.social Congrats to all authors @himanshuchhillar.bsky.social @leonardojo.bsky.social Amey Volkan @kaisakajala.bsky.social @jonathandgjones.bsky.social Supported primarily by the @erc.europa.eu #StG www.cell.com/cell-host-mi... @unileiden.bsky.social

Cell-type-specific activation of broadly perceived effector-triggered immunity restricts pathogen invasion in plants

Chhillar et al. reveal that plant immunity is organized across leaf tissues through specialized cell-type programs. While a shared core immune program is broadly activated, individual cell types deplo...

cell.com

📣 Job alert! 2 Positions starting 2027. PhD position with me and @bayerlab.bsky.social on Robustness of embryonic and stomatal development, part of @greenrobust.de Postdoc position on the regulation of cell state, following up on some exciting snRNAseq dat! Apply now or share! #PlantSciJob

Postdoc opportunity in my group! Please share! 🔁 Investigate the epigenetic mechanisms underlying stress memory in plants 🧬🌱 Looking for someone excited about computational genomics + plant molecular biology. 📍 Dundee, Scotland | 3 years 📅 Apply by 21 Sept www.dundee.ac.uk/work-for-us/...

Postdoctoral Research Assistant - UOD2369

Closing date: Monday 21 September 2026, 23:59

dundee.ac.uk

🌾 We're hiring a postdoc! Join the Stomatal Biology group in beautiful Bern @unibe.ch How do grass leaves spatially coordinate development of veins & stomatal rows? 2 years (plus possible extension), funded by @snsf.ch @dfg.de within @cerealcell.bsky.social RU5325 jobs.unibe.ch/job-vacancie...

Improved genome assemblies of plant-associated Streptomyces spp. as a resource for understanding plant pathogenicity in the genus https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.08.18.745569v1

Most TF families predictive for organismal complexity were gained during early plant evolution and act as homo- as well as heterodimers. Together, this suggests that gain of TF families as well as the rewiring of GRNs after gene duplication events are causative for plant morphological evolution.

Stefan A. Rensing @rensingstefan.bsky.social · 2w ago

Can the pretrained transformer-based architecture TabPFN predict plant organismal complexity based on their complement of transcription factors? Yes it can: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... Happy to hear your thoughts! @dvarshney.bsky.social @jandevries.bsky.social @watertoland.bsky.social

Can the pretrained transformer-based architecture TabPFN predict plant organismal complexity based on their complement of transcription factors? Yes it can: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... Happy to hear your thoughts! @dvarshney.bsky.social @jandevries.bsky.social @watertoland.bsky.social

Prediction of plant organismal complexity based on transcription factor annotation: an AI approach

How morphological complexity evolves is still enigmatic. While there is evidence in algae and plants as well as animals that diversification of the repertoire of transcription factors (TF) is causativ...

biorxiv.org

brocku.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/brocku_caree...

Engineering an Exo70 integrated domain of a barley NLR for improved blast resistance (Indira Saado, Helen J Brabham, Josh W Bennett, Anson Ho Ching Lam, Inmaculada Hernández-Pinzón , Matthew J Moscou, Juan Carlos De la Concepcion , Mark J Banfield) doi.org/10.1093/plce... #PlantScience @aspbofficial

Engineering an Exo70 integrated domain of a barley NLR for improved blast resistance

Engineering the barley NLR RGH2 enhances recognition of blast pathogen effectors from rice and wheat, leading to improved disease resistance.

doi.org

Elucidating the ancestral role of Class I HD-Zip transcription factors in land plants (Facundo Romani , Santiago Farías , Ariel Cerda Rojas , et al) doi.org/10.1093/plph... #PlantScience @aspbofficial @fromani @camplantsci

Elucidating the ancestral role of Class I HD-Zip transcription factors in land plants

The C1HDZ plant transcription factor family shapes stress and development responses differently across species, revealing how gene functions evolve while i

doi.org

🔬Big news🥳 We’re excited to welcome Prof. Dr. Rosa Lozano-Durán as new Director and head of the Department of Plant Virology @mpipz.bsky.social Her research focuses on how plant viruses interact with their hosts. 🎉Welcome to MPIPZ, Rosa 🌿🌱 www.mpipz.mpg.de/5842514/loza...

The Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research welcomes Prof. Dr. Rosa Lozano-Durán as new director

mpipz.mpg.de

New preprint alert! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... The conclusion of a long-lasting obsession about lipids, plant terrestrialization and the origin of plant symbioses 1/7 🧵 @pierremarcdelaux.bsky.social @katharinamel1.bsky.social @tatiana-vernie.bsky.social @kellerjeanphd.bsky.social

Conservation and divergence of UVR8 photoreceptor-mediated UV-B signaling in Marchantia polymorpha (Yuanke Liang , Roman Podolec , Richard Chappuis , et al doi.org/10.1093/plph... #PlantScience @aspbofficial @romanpodolec

Conservation and divergence of UVR8 photoreceptor-mediated UV-B signaling in Marchantia polymorpha

Plants share an ancient ultraviolet-B perception and signaling system, but its regulatory mechanisms have partially diverged.

doi.org

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/QvL4co Deadline - 18 August 2026 Contract - Until 7 August 2029, full-time

Research Assistant (Penfield Group) | John Innes Centre

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Research Assistant to join the Penfield Group at the John Innes Centre, working on cutting-edge science in the field of Crop Genetics.

okt.to

My department, Evolution and Ecology at UC Davis is hiring a plant evolution position! I am biased, but it's a great department 😃 apply here: recruit.ucdavis.edu/JPF07777

Now published in JBac. Absolutely great publishing experience!!! Thank you to editors and reviewers.https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/jb.00286-26 Another great one from @tommclean.bsky.social @johninnescentre.bsky.social @hbio-isp.bsky.social

TrbA binds and locks a sliding clamp KorB to repress transcription on multi-drug resistance plasmids | Journal of Bacteriology

Precise regulation of gene expression ensures gene products are produced at the right time and in the right amounts. Recent works uncovered a new mechanism of bacterial gene regulation based on a clamp sliding and locking in a multi-drug resistance plasmid, RK2. KorB functions as a CTP-dependent DNA-sliding clamp capable of traveling over a long genomic distance. Sliding KorB is captured and locked in place by a partner protein, KorA, forming a stable complex at target promoters to repress transcription. Here, we show that another RK2 regulator, TrbA, also uses this clamp sliding-locking mechanism, and identify an aromatic interface enabling TrbA-KorB-mediated transcriptional repression. Our findings show how a single sliding clamp integrates multiple partners to build a complex transcriptional regulatory network.

journals.asm.org

Tung Le@tunglejic.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Here, @tommclean.bsky.social shows that another RK2 regulator, TrbA, likely also use this “clamp sliding-locking” mechanism to regulate gene expression. Interesting how a single sliding clamp might integrate multiple partners to potentially build a complex regulatory network... shorturl.at/YQJOI

Our new Review is online! Nutrients can act as spatial signals that organise plant-microbe interactions. We discuss emerging tools and propose a cell-state framework linking plant and microbial cell states through local nutrient landscapes. sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Our study on giant transposons Starship 🚀🧬 in the genome of the lichen fungus Xanthoria is now out in @pnas.org! What did we find out about Starships in #lichen fungi? 👇Updated thread below 🖥️ 🧪 🦠 🧫 #SymbioSky 1/6 www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

🚨🪲🧫🌿 New preprint out! We talk a lot about obligate symbionts in insects, but what about environmentally acquired bacteria? Could they also help insects expand their nutritional capacities? Are they truly transient? Are insects transmitting more pathogens than we know? 🤯 🔗 doi.org/10.64898/202...

📣 We are now accepting applications to join the Plant Physiology Assistant Features Editor (AFE) program. These are two-year appointments, starting either in January 2027 or 2028. 👉 Learn more and apply now: blog.aspb.org/plantphys_af.... #PlantSci #PlantScience

I’m thrilled to share that our search for a tenure-track colleague in my *truly wonderful and collegial* Genetics, Genomics, Evolution and Development Division in the MCB Department at Berkeley @berkeleymcb.bsky.social is live! Please share this broad search widely: aprecruit.berkeley.edu/JPF05481

Assistant Professor -Genetics, Genomics, Evolution, and Development - Molecular and Cell Biology

University of California, Berkeley is hiring. Apply now!

aprecruit.berkeley.edu

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

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

John Innes Centre@johninnescentre.bsky.social · last mo.

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

#ASPBPlantPhysMonday #ICYMI

Plant Physiology@plantphys.bsky.social · last mo.

📣 We are now accepting applications to join the Plant Physiology Assistant Features Editor (AFE) program. These are two-year appointments, starting either in January 2027 or 2028. 👉 Learn more and apply now: blog.aspb.org/plantphys_af.... #PlantSci #PlantScience

Super useful! Keep your Marchantia clean everybody!

Darius Kosmützky@dariuskos.bsky.social · last mo.

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.

From #TSLSummer2015 @TheSainsburyLab to leading a delegation of Early Career Scientists from Japan 🇯🇵 Welcome back Aki @HiroakiAdachi3 and thank you for your dedication to mentorship 🙏

🚨 Faculty Cluster Hire in Crop Design/Synthetic Biology at @universityofga.bsky.social! 🌱 We're hiring 3 open-rank faculty for the Institute of Crop Design. Work in AI, synthetic biology, genome engineering, quantitative genetics, or crop design? Come join us! 🔗 tinylink.net/l48Ms