Interested in plant pathology, fungal development, cell biology. I study a disease called rice blast. Executive Director, The Sainsbury Laboratory- Views my own
I don’t often tweet personal news, but I feel compelled to tell the story of my mother Rosita Talbot, who died recently and whose funeral was held this week. She had a remarkable life.
I am grateful and honoured to receive an ERC Advanced Grant to study the role of septins during rice blast infections– SEPBLAST - exploring these remarkable morphogenetic proteins during plant disease 1/2
@TheSainsburyLab
#ERCAdG
📣 The results of the 2021 ERC Advanced Grants competition are out.
More than €624 million in funds were allocated to leading researchers in the European Union and
#HorizonEurope
associated countries.
All info 👉
🇪🇺
#EUfunded
#FrontierResearch
#ERCAdG
For any people confused about social distancing, who also know me (a small number I expect, but here goes). I am just over 2.0m tall. Separate yourselves in units of Nick T. - You're welcome.
#FlattenTheCurve
I felt very sad queuing up to get my passport stamped in Germany. A big sense of loss for the freedoms taken away. I am a European above all else. Haven’t had my passport stamped in EU since I was about 10 yrs old!!
We used a combination of cell biology, genetics, biochemistry & mathematical modelling to reveal that a sensor kinase controls turgor-driven plant infection by Magnaporthe.
Rotem Sorek - Remarkable how many eukaryotic innate immune systems have evolved from bacterial systems for protection against phage (including cGAS-STING, TIR domains, viperins, gasdermins, SAMHD1) -
#EESImmunity
As you are so happy to use a GM product to keep you healthy, isn't it time to reconsider Green Party opposition to GM technology that offers such potential for agriculture to cut GHG emissions & fossil fuel dependency, & become truly sustainable in a green economy??
So grateful to get my Astra Zeneca vaccination from
@BrightonCentre
today. Huge thanks to all the amazing staff & fab volunteers who make this happen every day - brilliantly efficient & so inspiring to see 🙏
When your time comes, do take it!
@nhs_scft
@SiobhanMelia
#Brighton
Congratulations
@AliceEseola
for successfully defending her PhD today. Thanks to examiners Regine Kahmann and
@neil_gow
- PhD
#42
Halpin
#8
and last one from
@UniofExeter
- very proud supervisor.
Congratulations to
@NeftalyCM
who successfully defended his PhD today. Here with proud supervisors, myself &
@Frank_Menke
and examiners
@dipietrolab
and Cyril Zipfel. PhD
#41
from my group!
The climate emergency is too urgent for the status quo in agriculture - we need innovative solutions that integrate advances in plant genetics with ecologically-sensitive organic production, to get off the chemical treadmill
I am having to cut a substantial amount from an ongoing
@GCRF
@BBSRC
grant, which directly helps rice growers in sub-Saharan Africa to ensure food security- it is a massive breach of trust to cut ongoing projects of real impact
@UKRI_News
@beisgovuk
Sad to hear of the death of Sydney Brenner. Great scientist, but to many of us who were grad students/postdocs in the 1990's he will always be 'Uncle Syd' from
@CurrentBiology
- Here's an example of his typical sage advice.
This shows very clearly the importance of early containment of COVID-19 and why every organisation needs to take responsibility for the communities in which they are situated.
#FlattenTheCurve
105 years ago today, my grandad fought in the Battle of the Somme. He lasted only 15 minutes until shot through the leg.He survived 12 hrs blood loss until a stretcher party picked him up. He lived until 1981 & believed strongly in the EC (now EU), because he despised war so much
A wonderful little book. Beautifully written, as you’d expect from the author. Synthesises so much biology in a clear and very simple way, and concludes with three principles that define life. Quite an achievement- definitely worth reading!
Peer-reviewed version of our phosphoproteomic analysis of Magnaporthe published today. We hope this resource, in which we identified conserved Pmk1-dependent phosphosites in 41 fungal species, will be valuable. 1/4
I don’t think these ivory towers actually exist. Only politicians who haven’t been near a university in years have these views. Universities are fully engaged across sectors of society- much more so than most politicians in the Westminster bubble.
There is a bit of an ivory tower mentality in some universities when they should be building partnerships across all sectors of society, says former Homer Secretary Charles Clarke from
#ResearchEx
Find all our coverage of the summit here
Congratulations to Barbara Valent
@ValentLab
for her well deserved election to the National Academy of Sciences USA
@theNASciences
#NAS157
- the whole rice blast research community salutes you, for all you have achieved.
I wrote this on the eve of the EU Referendum, worrying that the UK was about to make the biggest mistake of my lifetime. Well we will do that today. Nothing in the last 3 years has persuaded me otherwise. I will remain a European forever.
#IamEuropean
A bright future ahead for
@TheSainsburyLab
as we secure funding with
@JohnInnesCentre
for new world-leading infrastructure– laboratories, glasshouses, CERs, advanced technology centre –in an innovative net zero carbon design. 1/3
Found old school book from when I was very (very) young! I wrote an essay on food security. We looked at gains & losses to rice production- Getting a tractor was clearly important to me(!), but I was worried about lodging, and a disease called rice blast!
Interested in one of the most significant challenges in plant-microbe interactions? How does a lichen form from its constituent mycobiont and photobiont partners? How do morphogenetically complex lichen thalli develop?
@LeverhulmeTrust
-funded postdoctoral fellowship in my group.
Please RT: New PhD opportunity in our group
@TheSainsburyLab
in the
@NRPBIODTP
- if you are interested in how turgor-sensing works in appressoria of the blast fungus, please apply before November 20th. For details see below 👇
Well deserved recognition of
@KamounLab
for global impact of his leadership of
#openwheatblast
initiative to combat the devastating wheat blast disease.His inspiring speech spoke of his commitment to the global south & our shared humanity.
@joewinnz
#UEAIIAwards
Inspirational talk tonight from Jocelyn Bell Burnell at Gatsby Plant Science Network on the day she won the Breakthrough prize for discovery of radio pulsars & donated her $3 million prize to help women & under-represented groups into physics. Awesome & humbling to hear her story
This is a serious challenge for the UK science community. If we are to attract the best talent to the UK we need to be removing obstacles, not creating them. The rhetoric about being a science superpower from
@SciTechgovuk
is not consistent with actual government policy
The UK is planning on massively increasing visa costs.
Currently a researcher looking at a 5-year Global Talent Visa, together with their partner and two children, needs to find £13.4k.
All up front. A big ask.
But that’s now slated to increase to…
**£20.9k**
Very excited to announce the 2024 Cellular & Molecular Fungal Biology GRC organised by
@AnnaSelmecki
& myself with the theme of 'Fungal Communication' in all of its diverse forms. Vice-chairs
@DrValleyFever
&
@ElaineBignell
-Check out speakers & program using QR code below.
Great week at
#iCPP2023
with these great colleagues and friends. Thank you to the organisers. We all learned a lot and the conference highlighted the global significance of plant diseases and our role in helping ensure One Health
Amazing that this is sent without any irony. A steam train from the last century, moving backwards, is about the most appropriate analogy for Brexit I’ve seen
Reviewed version of our report of a forward genetic screen that identified a regulator of effector gene expression in Magnaporthe. It highlights how the expression of effector genes is highly orchestrated during infection-associated development.
We may be witnessing the rapid evolution of backbones among a group of organisms that were hitherto acting as invertebrates.....two cases so far, perhaps more will appear?
Congratulations to
@ClaraRHerrero
who successfully defended her PhD today to her examiners Mike Deeks
@Silystrngtheory
& Petra Boevink - a landmark for our group PhD
#40
.
'When the notion of starting a new botanical journal in this country was mooted, we were told by a certain distinguished botanist that it was not enough to shew there was room for a new periodical, necessity for its existence must be established.'
Happy 120th birthday to us! 🎂
Very welcome news that we will be part of Horizon Europe. Vital to our science base and the futures of our young scientists in particular. Thanks to
@GeorgeFreemanMP
for his commitment to get this done. It is greatly appreciated.
We've published a set of protocols from our lab, expertly compiled by
@CamilaMolinari3
that we hope the community will find valuable. Free through open access.
A Basic Guide to the Growth and Manipulation of the Blast Fungus, Magnaporthe oryzae
We show how the Pmk1 MAP kinase phosphorylates transcription factors Hox7 & Mst12 to control a hierarchical transcriptional network required for the major changes in gene expression necessary for infection cell development by Magnaporthe. A team effort led by
@OsesMir
This included my
@ERC_Research
grant. Now we wait to see if the
@UKRI_News
guarantee, for which I’ve applied, materialises. Hard to believe that UK science is in such a position.
#BrexitShambles
On Thursday the European Research Council terminated 115 grants offered to UK based researchers as UK breaks international law over NI. Science super-power? Forget it. UK science minister in dispute with Treasury over post-Brexit funding via
@FT
So sorry to hear that Nick Read has passed away. A fabulously talented fungal cell biologist, who contributed so much to the fungal biology community. Here he is at IMC9 in Edinburgh with Nancy Keller and John Taylor.
New work from our lab using CRISPR-Cas9-RNPs to carry out reproducible, efficient editing & co-editing of genes. We developed a novel counter-selection procedure that should be broadly applicable. Cas9 proved very toxic to M.o. when gene is introduced. RNPs are best way to go.
Last night we celebrated the life of our colleague and friend Ken Haynes
@UofEHL
. The
@UniofExeter
honoured Ken by naming The Haynes Bridge in the
#LSI
in his memory. Thanks to
@jusher1979
for organising such a wonderful event.
Check out our latest lichen paper. We have identified and characterised an alga, commonly associated with lichen symbioses, but which is not the primary photobiont. Fascinating study by
@metalichen
@thelichenlady
@angelyx97
👇
📑New Publication: Genomic analysis of Coccomyxa viridis, a common low‑abundance alga associated with lichen symbioses
@talbotlabTSL
@metalichen
@angelyx97
Full text 📷
John McCain’s concession speech from the 2008 election. Listen when the crowd “boos” Obama, he says stop and settles them. America, you are unrecognisable.
#ElectionResults2020
Please RT: A fully-funded PhD project is available in my group
@TheSainsburyLab
- Investigating effector function in the rice blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae - See also my collaborative PhD project with
@Frank_Menke
Details of both project are at link below.
👇TALBOT_S23DTP