Excited to share my postdoc work “Wetting of junctional condensates along the apical interface promotes tight junction belt formation” at
@honigmann_lab
@mpicbg
How do tight junctions form a closed belt in epithelial cells to seal our body cavities? 🧵
I'm thrilled to announce the opening of my laboratory today at the Rosalind Franklin Institute in Oxford & visiting at Oxford University. Very excited to start my independent path as group leader in such a vibrant place!
#newPI
660 young scientists from about 100 countries experience their first Lindau Moment today: They are invited to the 70th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting. Congratulations! They will meet around 70 Nobel Laureates at
#LINO70
We have welcomed a new group leader to our Next-Generation Chemistry team. Here at the Franklin,
@karina_pombo
will investigate the molecular organization of cell interfaces.
Read more about Dr Karina Pombo-Garcia here:
Starting now, our last Next Gen Science session with four great early career researchers:
#LINO70
young scientists Anuvab Das (Texas A&M) Kraina Pombo-Garcia (
@mpicbg
) Lorenz Adlung (
@WeizmannScience
) and
#LINO17
Lindau Alumnus Marios Kidonakis (
@UOC_gr
)
#LINO22
has been mind-blowing! full of energetic junior scientists & engaging discussions with the nobel laureates. Inspire and connect at it's best
@lindaunobel
Thanks to
@mpicbg
&
@maxplanckpress
for the nomination.
What an inspiration it has been listening to the Nobel laureate Sir Venkatramam Ramakrishnan debating about racism and bias in current science.
@lindaunobel
#LINO70
Grateful for being awarded the shared Prize for my flash talk poster at the
#EMBOCellPolarity
conference. Great science, discussions & community! Thanks Nate
@goehring_lab
& Anne
@Spang_Lab
for organizing it!
@EMBO
Delighted to announce that
@karina_pombo
is our inaugural Visiting Group Leader!
A new group leader at the
@RosFrankInst
, she is interested in the molecular assembly of cell-cell adhesions in epithelia tissue and in the pathology of intestinal diseases.
Hiring! We are looking for a full-time research assistant to join our team at
@RosFrankInst
to develop organoid systems for workflows on advance imaging. Exciting science and team!
#newPI
More information below👇 .
Our work was possible thanks to the great community of scientists at
@mpicbg
@csbdresden
@maxplanckpress
and the vibrant
#Dresden
atmosphere. Looking forward to keep exploring cell-cell interfaces in epithelia and their role in disease in my lab (currently applying) :)
BREAKING NEWS:
The 2020
#NobelPrize
in Chemistry has been awarded to Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer A. Doudna “for the development of a method for genome editing.”
Check out our paper on: How ZO Scaffolding Proteins Self-Organize Tight Junction Assembly via Phase Separation
Big thanks to Oliver Beutel and all authors for this great work! And to the facilities
@mpicbg
for their awesome support.
On Monday 24 June, Dr Karina Pombo-Garcia joins us to talk about "Molecular Organisation of Cell Junctions in Epithelial Tissue". Don't miss it!
🕚12:00-13:00
🏢Kennedy Lecture Theatre
💻Oxford Talks
The job market is wild, but it has been a fantastic experience. I have met many young leaders who truly inspire me to continue pursuing open, collaborative, and interdisciplinary science. Despite the many challenges, it remains a fulfilling profession. Off we go!
#newPI
We propose apical interface wetting of junctional condensates drives the tight junction belt formation that seals our tissues. Our model highlights how cells tune the emergent properties of protein condensates with membranes to actively shape functional mesoscale structures.
10/Our model explains the tight junction belt formation via
#prewetting
of ZO1 on the membrane at apical-lateral interface providing a mechanism of how assembly of cell adhesion complexes is guided by the cell polarity machinery & bridges the molecular interaction to mesoscale.
6/ PATJ KO disrupts fusion and elongation of ZO1 condensates leading to broken belts.Condensate growth requires attractive interactions between the membrane and the condensate, which could be mediated by PATJ. We quantify the condensate dynamics and observed a linear growth in WT
From 19-21 June, almost 500 Lindau Alumni,
#LINO70
young scientists and
#LINOEcon
young economists will work together in 48 project groups during our first-ever Online
#Sciathon
. Find more information on the projects here:
My lab will investigate the molecular assembly of cell adhesions in epithelial intestinal tissue & its pathological dysregulation after pathogen entry & inflammation. Join us if you are interested in super-resolution STED microscopy, chemical biology, gut-organoids & condensates
I'm very thankful to the full
@mpicbg
family for being the absolute dream place to do a postdoc. Thanks to my PhD & Postdoc supervisors
@Honigmann_Lab
for exciting times uncovering junction biophysics. & to family and friends for their constant support throughout this journey.
Using time-resolved proximity proteomics we show the dynamic changes in the molecular composition of junctional
#condensates
during tight junction assembly. Apical proteins arrive as ZO1 condensates elongate, suggesting a link between molecular events and mesoscale belt changes
Analysis of the ultrastructure using STED super-resolution reveals an interface between junctional condensates & the apical domain visualising ZO1 & PATJ at nanoscale. Condensate adhesion to this interface allows the linear wetting into a close belt & polymerisation of TJ-strands
Quantitative live imaging of endogenous dual Knock-In confirms the slow arrival apical PATJ provide adhesive properties to ZO1 condensates that overcome the surface tension and spread on the membrane into a thin belt.
Knockout of apical protein PATJ disrupts fusion and spreading of ZO1 condensates leading to broken belts. In general, spreading of liquid droplets on a surface (wetting) depends on the balance between adhesion (propensity to spread) and surface tension, propensity to stay as drop
5/Imaging the endogenous apical protein PATJ together with ZO1 confirmed that PATJ arrival correlates with elongation of ZO1 condensates on the membrane
Nobel Laureate David MacMillan
@Princeton
gives the first lecture of
#LINO22
. To begin, he stresses how excited he is to be here, to talk to young scientists - and the Nobel Laureates, as he's still quite new to being a laureate himself. He then moves on to talk about his work.
We are pleased to launch
#spotLights
, an interview series featuring the
#ECRs
behind exciting new
#preprints
.🎙️
@bruvellu
@mpicbg
is our first guest – he talks about the story behind his recent work on the cephalic furrow.
Listen below or on our website!
1/Experiments + theory show tight junction formation depends on the growth of a condensed layer of ZO1 at the interface between the apical and lateral membrane of epithelia, providing insight into how cells use condesates to assemble and shape complex mesoscale structures.
Day 1/7 of my
#lifeinpictures
No people, no words, challenge a person every day. I was nominated by the great crumbs lover
@AnnaBajur
. Today I nominate the talented
@RanaaAmini
3/Interactions of condensates with surfaces can drive deformations. In physics this phenomena is known as wetting transitions. We speculated that cells specifically tune the interactions of ZO1 condensates with the membrane to shape the functional tight junction belt.
Do you have expertise in
#Bioinformatics
,
#DataScience
and
#MachineLearning
? Are you looking for new opportunities to use your skills to make a real difference? I am expanding my data science team right now and would love to hear from you.
Please RT
#DiaDasLetrasGalegas
O galego é noso. Dos que o falamos, dos que llo trasmitimos as novas xeracións con orgullo e sen prexuízo. Dos emigrados que amamos o noso acento. Nun mundo de globalizaciòn faise aínda máis importante manter as orixes.
#EuFaloGalego
#LetrasGalegas2020
2/Tight junctions nucleate at the cytoplasmic side of cell-cell adhesion contacts as membrane attached ZO1 condensates. We ask the question how these initially round condensates are shaped into a continuous belt around the cell perimeter?
EMBO Gold Medal awarded to Elvan Böke
@LabBoke
to recognize her pioneering research on physiological mechanisms that enable oocytes to stay healthy over decades of dormancy
@CRGenomica
How important is to combine novel
#proteomics
&
#imaging
tools to uncover the great complexity of the apical junctional complex. Great work by the
@alexludwigNTU
lab
Our latest paper is now online! Using proximity proteomics and EM with APEX2 we find that the Crumbs complex defines a distinct membrane compartment apical of the tight junction, and recruits quite a few novel Hippo and actin regulators to this domain!
Day 2/7 of my
#lifeinpictures
. No people, no words, challenge a person every day. I was nominated by
@AnnaBajur
. Today I nominate the outstanding person & scientist
@VictoriaYan_
8/Prewetting is a special case of wetting when the concentration in the bulk (cytoplasm) is below the concentration required to from 3D condensates, as in ZO1. Under prewetting conditions condensates can only grow on the membrane surface 2D, where interactions are favourable.
4/Using time-resolved proximity proteomics we found dynamic changes in the molecular composition of junctional
#condensate
, apical proteins become enriched in ZO1 when condensate elongate, suggesting a link between molecular events and mesoscale belt changes.
9/Closer inspection of PATJ localization at nanoscale using STED super-resolution revealed that PATJ is enriched at interface between junctional condensates and the apical membrane, which supports its role in mediating wetting of ZO1 and provides spatial specificity.
@NereaIrigoyen
Gracias por decirlo. Ojalá se nos escuchara más a los cientìficos. Pero no solo el gobierno sino la sociedad. Aquì una científica bioquìmica, trabajando en el SARS-CoV2 en el Max planck en alemania donde vivo desde hace 10 años. No lo han hecho mejor aquì.
@manuelreyp
Boa reflexiòn. Gustariame saber a % de cientìficos galegos emigrados nesta decada. Se hai que sacar a bandeira para que se lembren de nos sacase :)
7/ We compared our the experimental elongation dynamics in cells to the thermodynamics theory of wetting. This analysis showed that a prewetting transition of ZO1 along the apical interface recapitulates the key experimental findings observed in elongation dynamics.
BREAKING NEWS:
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the 2022
#NobelPrize
in Chemistry to Carolyn R. Bertozzi, Morten Meldal and K. Barry Sharpless “for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry.”
España me formó. 6 años en un instituto público, 5 años de Biología y un máster en la UAM y 5 años de doctorado en el CNIO. Gracias a las becas jamás pagué nada. Ahora que llegó el momento de devolver a la sociedad la inversión lo hago en el extranjero.
#SinCienciaNoHayFuturo
We're halfway through our
#Sciathon
. Patron Brian P. Schmidt
@VC_ANU
greets the participants: "You'll be the future of the world in solving this problem that my generation, and my parents generation, created. So get your thinking caps on!"
#climatechange