Author | Lightnews

Andi Wilson, PhD

@drandiwilson.bsky.social

520 followers 400 following 93 posts

NNF-funded postdoc at UCPH 🍄🦗🌿🇩🇰 I post about Science🔬 & Chronic Migraine 💊 She/Her 🏳️‍🌈 Opinions are my own

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Nov 11

My super power is turning tea into manuscripts 🫖💪📰

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · May 22

The most elegant diagram to explain what the scientific process and the average research project looks like ✨️

So many side tracks that eventually don't make it into the final story, but are an integral part of the process.

From Yanai & Lercher (2025) in Nature Biotech

A figure with three diagrams. The first is labeled "plan" and is a straight line of arrows from top to bottom. The second is labeled "process" and is a tree-like diagram, branching out from top to bottom, showing multiple different paths from one starting point to multiple end points. The third is labeled "publication" and is the same tree-like diagram from before, but with a single track highlighted to show what actually makes it into the publication

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · May 12

56 RNAseq samples done and ready to be shipped! 🥳🧬🧫🧪🔬

A photo of 56 eppendorf tubes in a red holder. Different coloured labels (blue, green, purple, pink, orange and yellow) are stuck on the lids of the tubes and indicate the sampleIDs

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · May 2

Seeing Jennifer Doudna speak this afternoon at the Black Diamond in Copenhagen 🧬🧫🔬

Appropriately dressed in my #CRISPREngineer shirt from @thermofishersci.bsky.social 🧬💁‍♀️

A selfie of me wearing a purple tshirt, with writing saying "CRISPR ENGINEER" and an image of a pair of scissors cutting a piece of DNA.

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 28

10 years ago, I published my first, first-author paper 🤩

In some ways, it feels like just yesterday and I'm still a baby masters student 🥹

In other ways, it feels like this was 100 years ago 👵

Either way, the joy of seeing your work published never goes away ❤️

A screenshot of a fb memory from 10 years ago, showing the publication of my first, first author paper in fungal genetics and biology.
The title is "Unisexual reproduction in Huntiella moniliformis".

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 25

Blood. Sweat. Tears.

Locust & root media.

🧪🔬🧫
🦗🌾

A photo of 24 small flasks, 12 of which have a dark liquid orange medium in them and 12 of which have a light yellow medium in them

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

🧪🧬 We acknowledge support from FABI, UCPH, The Novo Nordisk Foundation, and the NRF! And I thank my co-authors for their contributions to this manuscript 🍄🤩

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

🧪🧬 We also provide a schematic and lots of in text details on how you can optimize this protocol for use in your own species! 🧬🧪

Flow chart representing the protoplast extraction protocol. Factors that may require
species-specific optimization are illustrated at each step, and optional steps that may improve
protoplast yield and quality are included in light grey boxes.

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

🧪🧬 Protocol 5 is for Sclerotinia sclerotiorum- the fungus with a host range of more than 400 plant species! 🌾🍀🌿🌳 This protocol uses immature mycelium as a starting point

Protoplasting of Sclerotinia sclerotiorum. (A) Unpigmented mycelia from S.sclerotiorum
(CMW 60861) to be used as digestion starting material. (B) Extracted protoplasts after 3 hr of
digestion. Scale bar, 10 μm. Inset shows a zoomed-in protoplast (B).

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

🧪🧬 Protocol 4 is for Ophiostoma novo-ulmi, the Dutch elm disease pathogen 🌲🍄 This protocol uses a DTT-EDTA pre-treatment and uses conidia as the starting material ⚗️

Protoplasting of Ophiostoma novo-ulmi. (A) Conidia from O.novo-ulmi (CMW 10573) to
be used as the starting material for the digestion. (B) Protoplasts extracted after ∼3 hr of digestion.
Scale bars, 10 μm. Insets show a zoomed-in conidium (A) and a zoomed-in protoplast (B).

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

🧪🧬 Protocol 3 is for Metarhizium species- fungi that infect and cause death in insects, including various agricultural pests 🦗 The protocol uses mature mycelium as a starting point.

Protoplasting of Metarhizium species. (A) Conidia from Metarhizium acridum (ARSEF
3391). (B) Mature mycelium from Metarhizium brunneum (KVL 12-30) to be used as the starting
material for the digestion. (C) Extracted protoplasts from Metarhizium acridum (ARSEF 3391) after
∼1 hr; some cellular debris is also visible. Scale bars, 10 μm. Insets show a zoomed-in conidium
(A) and two zoomed-in protoplasts (C).

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

🧪🧬 Protocol 2 is for Fusarium circinatum- the notorious pine pathogen that causes devastation in natural and managed forests 🌲 This protocol describes extraction from a mixture of mycelium and conidia

Protoplasting of Fusarium circinatum. (A) A combination of conidia and mycelia from
F. circinatum (CMW 350) after a 36-hr incubation in potato dextrose broth. This is the material
to be used as the starting material for the digestion. (B) Extracted protoplasts after digestion for
∼24 hr. Scale bars, 10 μm. Insets shows two zoomed-in conidia (A) and a zoomed-in protoplast
(B), and arrows point at mycelium (A).

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

🧪🧬 Protocol 1 is for Ceratocystis species and describes the extraction of protoplasts from mycelium, using a density gradient to purify the protoplasts 🍄🌲

Protoplasting of Ceratocystis species. (A) Maturemycelia grown fromC.fimbriata (CMW
14799) conidia, to be used as the starting material for the digestion. (B) Sorbitol overlay of the protoplasts,
showing distinct layers. The region wherein the protoplasts are expected to settle (between
3 and 4 ml) is indicated by the white bracket. (C) Extracted protoplasts after ∼3 hr of digestion and
isolation. Scale bar, 10 μm. Inset shows a zoomed-in protoplast (C).

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

We present 5 protocols, each optimized in a different fungal genus, for species important in agriculture 🌾 & forestry 🌲

We use an enzyme from the wine industry, #Extralyse, to overcome the reliance on cost-prohibitive lab-grade enzymes whose availability is unreliable 🥲🧪🧬

Basic Protocol 1: Protoplast extractions from Ceratocystis eucalypticola and
Ceratocystis fimbriata
Basic Protocol 2: Protoplast extractions from Fusarium circinatum
Basic Protocol 3: Protoplast extractions from Metarhizium acridum, Metarhizium
brunneum, and Metarhizium guizhouense
Basic Protocol 4: Protoplast extractions from Ophiostoma novo-ulmi
Basic Protocol 5: Protoplast extractions from Sclerotinia sclerotiorum

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Apr 3

Super excited to share our newest paper, out in
Current protocols!

A collab btwn FABI & UCPH, we put together protoplast extraction protocols for 5 different fungal genera! 🍄

With applications for genome editing & long read seq, we hope this will be super useful! 🧪🧬

A screenshot of the article title and author list:
"Extracting Protoplasts from Filamentous Fungi Using Extralyse, An Enzyme Used in the Wine Industry"

Andi Wilson, Alida van Dijk, Bianke Marx, Deanne du Plessis,
Grant Terblanche, Simoné Bornman, P. Markus Wilken,
Tuan A. Duong, Henrik H. De Fine Licht, and Brenda D. Wingfield

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 22

It's taken a while, but I'm finally trying a #MigraineHat.. 😅

I've been an icepack girlie for a very long time, but this 360° cooling effect is 👌

Not to mention the sound and light dulling effect too 😎

#Migraine #ChronicMigraine

A selfie of me wearing a light blue migraine hat

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 21

And with that, another 4000-odd seeds have been sowed again 🌱💪

A photo of little piles of germinating barley seeds that are being transferred into ziplock germination pouches

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 21

Wednesday was the first sampling day and... my root and locust media was contaminated by this bacteria left 🧫

But after some tears and a restless night, I know what went wrong and how to fix it 💪

Hopefully with the added experience, setting up Round 2 won't take as long! 🤞

Three photos: 1) barley seeds germinating from ziplock bag germination pouches, 2) barley plants with their leaves and roots exposed in a germination pouch, 3) a bottle of root-infused liquid

Three photos: 1) a locust sitting on a lettuce leaf, 2) freeze dried locusts in a glass beaker, 3) a bottle of locust-infused liquid

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 21

This little plate and its tiny bacteria left me heartbroken on Wednesday evening 💔

After months of planning and preparing, a pre-pilot trial and a pilot trial, I started my large RNAseq experiment last week 🥳

If everything went to plan, I'd be done by 28 March. But biology had other plans... 🧬

A photo of a green gloved hand holding a small petridish with bacteria growing all over it in tiny white colonies

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 11

Safety first ⚠️

#Mycology #MolecularBiology #RNAseq #LiquidNitrogen

A photo of open elevator doors. There is a liquid nitrogen flask on the floor and the safety tape closing the elevators.

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 6

And I can finally say that my pilot experiment starts tomorrow 💪🌱🦗

If everything goes according to plan, the full experiment starts week after next!

Let's go! 🤩 #MycoSky #FungiSky #RNASeq

A photo of 12 flat bottom flasks in the LAF bench. They have varying colours of amber-coloured medium in them

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 4

The hardest ~35g I've ever worked for 😅🌱

Harvesting roots for this experiment has been a challenge 💪

Turns out that 360g of wet weight barley root = 36g dry weight 😂

But we've got the goods and the pilot experiment is underway!

A photo of three schott bottles, each of which has barley roots soaking in water

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Reposted by Andi Wilson, PhD

Clement Tsui PhD 🇭🇰 🇨🇦 @clementsui.bsky.social · Mar 4

Genomic divergence across the tree of life | PNAS www.pnas.org/doi/full/10....

Genomic divergence across the tree of life | PNAS

Nucleotide sequence data are being harnessed to identify species, even in cases in which organisms themselves are neither in hand nor witnessed. Bu...

www.pnas.org

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Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 3

Hard relate.

Decided not to go for good reasons, but the fomo is still real- especially when I know so many of my favourites fungi people are there! 🍄

S. Lorena Ament @loreament.bsky.social · Mar 3

Getting massive FOMO from all the #ECFG17 posts. It looks fun!

Andi Wilson, PhD @drandiwilson.bsky.social · Mar 3

Same!!

Reposted by Andi Wilson, PhD

Johannes Debler @jwdebler.bsky.social · Feb 28

Know anything about mycoviruses or fungal plasmids? Come see me at #ECFG17 and help me figure out what this circular element is I keep finding in Ascochyta pathogens of lentil and chickpea.

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