Congrats to IGI alum Connor Tou on being named a 2025 #STATWunderkind! At the IGI, Connor worked on CRISPR EvolvR in John Dueber's lab and now, as a Ph.D. student at MIT, he's working on genome engineering with large insertions.

1/10 Genome maintenance by telomerase is a fundamental process in nearly all eukaryotes. But where does it come from?

Today, we report the discovery of telomerase homologs in a family of antiviral RTs, revealing an unexpected evolutionary origin in bacteria.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Congrats to @connorjtou.bsky.social on being named a 2025 #STATWunderkind. His enthusiasm in the lab is contagious and he thrives on doing really hard things.
Really well deserved recognition for an innovator and emerging leader in our field! 👏 🙌
@mgbresearch.bsky.social @harvardmed.bsky.social

Taking the stage are three of this year's #STATWunderkinds!

Meet the class of 2025: www.statnews.com/wunderkinds/

#STATSummit

Thanks Dimitrios! 🙏

At a time when conflict and cynicism seem to be shadowing much of health and medicine, @statnews.com is recognizing some of the brightest young minds in their fields this morning.

www.statnews.com/wunderkinds/

Honored to be part of the 2025 #STATWunderkinds! Grateful for the many supportive mentors, colleagues, and friends with special shoutout to @bkleinstiver.bsky.social.

Full list: www.statnews.com/wunderkinds/

@statnews.com @mitdeptofbe.bsky.social @mgbresearch.bsky.social @harvardmed.bsky.social

How can we understand the earliest events in evolution of eukaryotic immunity? @yao-li.bsky.social reports incredible molecular fossils of complete bacterial-like operons in eukaryotes that illuminate how animal immunity was first acquired from anti-phage defense

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Today in the journal Science: BioEmu from Microsoft Research AI for Science. This generative deep learning method emulates protein equilibrium ensembles – key for understanding protein function at scale. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

If you like transposons...
If you you love genome editing...
Or if you just like random bird animations,

we have the paper for you!

We (@kedmonds.bsky.social et al) are happy to share our work turning a songbird retrotransposon into a genome editing tool. 🐣 (1/n)

Click editing uses DNA polymerases, HUH endonucleases and oligonucleotide templates for genome modification go.nature.com/3zPEIjp
rdcu.be/erfhL

1/10 New pre-print(s) from the Sternberg Lab in collaboration with Leifu Chang's Lab! We uncover the unprecedented molecular mechanism of CRISPR-Cas12f-like proteins, which drive RNA-guided transcription independently of canonical promoter motifs.
Full story here:
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

1/10 Today in @science.org in collaboration with
the Liu group we report the development of a laboratory-evolved CRISPR-associated transposase (evoCAST) that supports therapeutically relevant levels of RNA-programmable gene insertion in human cells. drive.google.com/file/d/1I-Ub...

So excited to share our new paper out today in @nature.com. We repurposed R2 retrotransposons to create STITCHR, a tool that can make virtually any kind of edit in mammalian genomes including the scarless multi-kilobase scale insertions 🧵

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Interested in learning more about genome editing tool dev & their application to treat human diseases? 🧬 🏥
We're hiring graduating seniors who are seeking ~2 years of post-bac research experience.
If you're interested in gaining experience in next gen medicines, please reach out and apply!
Link 👇

Would also love to be added! 🙏

Thanks Dimitrios! Maybe almost time for a starter pack 🤔