HRMEM
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hrmem.bsky.social
HRMEM
@hrmem.bsky.social
Facility for high resolution macromolecular cryo-EM. Located
@UBC
. Keeping it 100K.
Reposted by HRMEM
Final part of my PhD work is now out! We were able to develop a nanobody that inhibits EFR3 mediated PI4KA membrane recruitment. Potential therapeutic idea?
Amazing collaboration with different labs using a host of different techniques. @alexlouiseshaw.bsky.social
Cool new paper (www.jbc.org/article/S002... from my lab spearheaded by graduate students Sushant @sushantsuresh.bsky.social and Alex @alexlouiseshaw.bsky.social . This was a very cool collaboration with the Scott Hansen, Jennifer Cobb, Tamas Balla labs
www.jbc.org
November 6, 2025 at 12:17 AM
Reposted by HRMEM
New preprint from the lab headed up by
@sushantsuresh.bsky.social! Late last year, we published the molecular basis of PI4KA plasma membrane recruitment by EFR3 (PMID:39705356). This work builds on these findings and identifies a new potential therapeutic avenue! Check it out!
Development of an inhibitory TTC7B selective nanobody that blocks EFR3 recruitment of PI4KA https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.07.28.667261v1
August 6, 2025 at 4:19 AM
Reposted by HRMEM
Cool new paper (www.jbc.org/article/S002... from my lab spearheaded by graduate students Sushant @sushantsuresh.bsky.social and Alex @alexlouiseshaw.bsky.social . This was a very cool collaboration with the Scott Hansen, Jennifer Cobb, Tamas Balla labs
www.jbc.org
November 5, 2025 at 10:31 PM
Reposted by HRMEM
Thanks to the UBC media team for coverage of our statin : RyR1 work. Atorvastatins bind and trigger opening of a calcium release channel critical for muscle contraction.
news.ubc.ca/2025/11/ubc-...

@ubcmedicine.bsky.social
UBC researchers uncover how statins harm muscles—and how to stop it  - UBC News
Study reveals how cholesterol-lowering drugs can trigger muscle damage—and point to a way to make them safer.
news.ubc.ca
November 26, 2025 at 5:52 PM
Reposted by HRMEM
Our latest work : Statins are used to lower plasma cholesterol but often come with muscle-related side effects. Using cryo-EM, we show how multiple statin molecules cooperate to bind RyR1, a calcium release channel mainly found in skeletal muscle.
nature.com/articles/s41...
November 21, 2025 at 6:42 PM
Check out this paper, for which we collected data for Rashmi Panigrahi and the Glover lab at UAlberta! We needed a tilted collection to get the side views of these nucleosomes, and it was a lot of fun working with our colleagues from another province!
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41123210/ #cryoEM ❄️🔬🇨🇦
Structural insights into γH2Ax containing nucleosomes - PubMed
The phosphorylation of the histone variant H2AX on the nucleosome, yielding γH2AX, acts as a 'master control switch', signaling the recruitment of DNA repair factors at DNA double-stranded break sites. This phosphorylation is recognized by BRCA1 carboxy-terminal (BRCT) domains of specific repair pro …
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
October 23, 2025 at 9:06 PM
We are excited to share the recent paper from @filipvanpetegem.bsky.social featuring cryo-EM structures of the KCNQ1 potassium channel collected at HRMEM!
#cryoEM #structuralbiology
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com
October 6, 2025 at 6:57 PM
Reposted by HRMEM
Our cryo-EM structure of the intermediate state of the KCNQ1 potassium channel is out. Collaborative effort with the David Fedida and Luca Maragliano labs. Cryo-EM work spearheaded by Efthimios Kyriakis, PhD

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
October 3, 2025 at 6:44 PM
HRMEM is excited to share this new paper from the Cullis lab! Congrats to Miffy Cheng et al!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Liposomal lipid nanoparticles for extrahepatic delivery of mRNA - Nature Communications
Long-circulating, transfection-competent LNP-mRNA systems are key for effective extrahepatic delivery. Here, authors show that LNPs with high bilayer lipid ratios yield high mRNA encapsulation, prolon...
www.nature.com
July 4, 2025 at 5:08 PM
HRMEM is excited to spotlight this excellent review of cell envelope diversity and evolution from HRMEM cryoET user Eltiza Tocheva (@elitzatocheva.bsky.social‬) and team.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Cell envelope diversity and evolution across the bacterial tree of life - Nature Microbiology
This Review discusses the diversity of cell envelope architectures across major bacterial phyla and highlights conserved features found in diderm lineages.
www.nature.com
June 24, 2025 at 8:23 PM
HRMEM is happy to spotlight this exciting work, which applied a magnetic separation technique to characterize LNP bimolecular coronas.

Congratulations to Valentina Francia, Yao Zhang and colleagues from the Cullis lab at UBC.

We are proud to have supported this work! 🔬

doi.org/10.1073/pnas...
A magnetic separation method for isolating and characterizing the biomolecular corona of lipid nanoparticles | PNAS
Lipid nanoparticle (LNP) formulations are a proven method for the delivery of nucleic acids for gene therapy as exemplified by the worldwide rollou...
www.pnas.org
June 9, 2025 at 8:00 PM
Reposted by HRMEM
In case you missed our May webinar, it is now available!! Ellen Zhong from Princeton University presented CryoDRGN-AI.

Topic: CryoDRGN-AI: Neural ab initio reconstruction of challenging cryo-EM and cryo-ET datasets
Host: Pete Meyer
Recorded on: May 20, 2025

buff.ly/jKjWTOa

#SBGridWebinars
CryoDRGN
SBGrid webinars are hosted with partial support from the NIH R25 Continuing Education for Structural Biology Mentors #GM151273, in collaboration with Co-PI J...
youtu.be
June 2, 2025 at 4:30 PM
HRMEM is proud to spotlight this structure of the cardiac potassium channel, KCNQ1, bound to its activator, ML277!

Shout to Katrien Willegems, Jodene Eldstrom, Efthimios Kyriakis, Fariba Ataei and researchers from the Fedida and Van Petegem Labs at UBC! 🔬🫀🧬

#cryoEM

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Structural and electrophysiological basis for the modulation of KCNQ1 channel currents by ML277 - Nature Communications
KCNQ1 channels are active in heart, brain and gut. Functional loss causes epilepsy and sudden arrhythmic death. Here, authors describe a key activator drug binding site, explaining isoform and drug se...
www.nature.com
May 26, 2025 at 9:46 PM
HRMEM is happy to spotlight this structure of calcineurin bound to PI4KA determined by Alexandria Shaw and colleagues from the Burke Lab at the University of Victoria and the Yip Lab at UBC!

We are proud to have provided the electron microscopy for this work!

Read more:
doi.org/10.1016/j.st...
Structure of calcineurin bound to PI4KA reveals dual interface in both PI4KA and FAM126A
Phosphatidylinositol 4-kinase alpha (PI4KA) maintains the phosphatidylinositol 4-phosphate (PI4P) and phosphatidylserine pools of the plasma membrane.…
www.sciencedirect.com
May 14, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Reposted by HRMEM
Mass Spec + lasers + cryoEM = COOL SCIENCE!

New research from @coonlab.bsky.social and the Grant Lab combines mass spec to land proteins on TEM grids, a laser to restore protein structure, and cryoEM imaging and analysis to produce 3D reconstructions.

www.mcponline.org/article/S153...
Laser-Induced Rehydration of Cryo-Landed Proteins Restores Native Structure
The use of native mass spectrometry (MS) to land biological molecules for subsequent cryogenic electron microscopy (cryoEM) imaging and three-dimensional reconstruction has gained momentum in recent y...
www.mcponline.org
May 14, 2025 at 3:12 PM
Reposted by HRMEM
Hey #TeamTomo,
Ever been in need of a tutorial about the fundamentals of cryo-electron tomography? From preprocessing raw frames to high-res subtomogram averaging?
That's why @florentwaltz.bsky.social and I made this website!

tomoguide.github.io

Follow the thread 1 /🧵
#CryoET #CryoEM 🔬🧪
Welcome to TomoGuide
A step-by-step Cryo-ET guide
tomoguide.github.io
May 6, 2025 at 4:27 PM
We are happy to spotlight these structures of human ABCA4, a crucial transporter for ocular function, determined by Jéssica Fernandes Scortecci and colleagues from the Molday and Van Petegem Labs at UBC! 🔬

We are happy to have supported this work! #cryoEM

Read more:
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Cryo-EM structures of the ABCA4 importer reveal mechanisms underlying substrate binding and Stargardt disease - Nature Communications
ABCA4 is an ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporter that flips N-retinylidenephosphatidylethanolamine (N-Ret-PE) to the cytoplasmic leaflet of photoreceptor membranes. ABCA4 mutations are associated wi...
www.nature.com
May 6, 2025 at 5:14 PM
Cryo-ET of Thermotoga maritima in a study led by Danielle Sexton and colleagues from the Tocheva Lab at UBC broadened our understanding of outer membrane biogenesis!

Shout out to @elitzatocheva.bsky.social !

Read more about this awesome work supported by HRMEM here:

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
The cell envelope of Thermotogae suggests a mechanism for outer membrane biogenesis | PNAS
The presence of a cell membrane is one of the major structural components defining life. Recent phylogenomic analyses have supported the hypothesis...
www.pnas.org
May 2, 2025 at 6:27 PM
Reposted by HRMEM
🚨New preprint!🚨 #teamtomo
We expanded Surface Morphometrics to quantify membrane thickness from cryo-ET—revealing local variation across organelles.

Led by the lab’s first grad student, @mmedina300kv.bsky.social (defending Monday! 🍾) w/ @attychang.bsky.social @hamid13r.bsky.social & @tomo.science
Surface morphometrics reveals local membrane thickness variation in organellar subcompartments https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.04.30.651574v1
May 1, 2025 at 7:42 PM
Bin Zhao and colleagues from the Cullis Lab at UBC have developed a technique to determine the pH inside LNPs using a pH-sensitive fluorescent dye-based DNA probe. 🧬🔬

HRMEM is happy to have supported the electron microscopy for this exciting research!

Read more :

doi.org/10.1016/j.bi...
Determination of the interior pH of lipid nanoparticles using a pH-sensitive fluorescent dye-based DNA probe
Lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) containing ionizable cationic lipids are proven delivery systems for therapeutic nucleic acids, such as small interfering R…
www.sciencedirect.com
April 28, 2025 at 11:07 PM
Reposted by HRMEM
"Not only will it provide sharper details of proteins and other molecules imaged with cryo-EM," says
@berkeleylab.lbl.gov 's Peter Denes, "but it should enable microscopists to image even proteins roughly half the size of what is currently possible."
Ultracool microscopy yields a sharper look at proteins
After years of frustration, researchers learn how to sharpen molecular images with liquid helium
www.science.org
April 22, 2025 at 3:56 PM
We are excited to spotlight this structure of the type 3 ryanodine receptor determined by Yu Seby Chen and colleagues from UBC and the University of Siena!

It was a pleasure to collaborate with the Van Petegem (@filipvanpetegem.bsky.social) Lab on this lovely work!

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Cryo-EM investigation of ryanodine receptor type 3 - Nature Communications
Ryanodine Receptor type 3 mediates ER Ca2+ release in different cell types. Here, the authors use cryo-EM to reveal a binding site for chloride and two distinct sites for ATP. Epileptic encephalopathy...
www.nature.com
April 22, 2025 at 11:19 PM
HRMEM is happy to have supported this structure determination of Rab3GAP by Gage Fairlie, Kha Nguyen and colleagues.

Congratulations to the Burke Lab (@jburkevic.bsky.social )at the University of Victoria and the Yip Lab at UBC! 🔬🎉

Read more here:
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Biochemical and structural characterization of Rab3GAP reveals insights into Rab18 nucleotide exchange activity - Nature Communications
Rab3GAP, a guanine nucleotide exchange factor for Rab18, regulates membrane trafficking and lipid droplet metabolism. The authors elucidated its molecular structure, mapped its potential substrate bin...
www.nature.com
April 17, 2025 at 10:06 PM