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Reposted by Angus Bucknell

The Sainsbury Laboratory @thesainsburylab.bsky.social · 6d

So happy to have @mcdonaldmeganc.bsky.social with us for the day!

Sophien Kamoun @kamounlab.bsky.social · 6d

Our @TheSainsburyLab postdoc invited speaker is Megan McDonald @McdonaldMeganc — jumping genes and pathogenic schemes.

Prof. Megan will be joining @ETH_en in 2026!!!! 🎉 🥳 👏🏼 #planthealth #plantpath ethz.ch/en/news-and-...

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Sep 6

Delighted that our work on the Sanctuary Starship #transposon is now published! A big thanks to all co-authors, especially to the ever-amazing @mcdonaldmeganc.bsky.social for her mentorship!

doi.org/10.1128/mbio...

Sanctuary: a Starship transposon facilitating the movement of the virulence factor ToxA in fungal wheat pathogens | mBio

The work presented here expands our understanding of a novel group of mobile genetic elements called Starships that facilitate the horizontal exchange of numerous genes between fungal pathogens. Our a...

doi.org

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Aug 3

Yes! During my extremely brief foray into Rust, the error messages (there’s been a lot!) have been extremely helpful.

I’m hoping to put in some proper time into learning Rust soon. Do you have any advice for those who have only worked with high-level languages?

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Rob Patro @robp.bsky.social · Aug 3

I talk a lot about Rust for building high-perf (& even non-perf critical) software, & scientific software in particular. I often discuss what's interesting to me, but wanted to offer the chance to those interested for me to answer their questions about Rust in science. Fire away with questions!🧬🖥️

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Aug 3

There’s plenty of plotting libraries now, I’ve settled on Makie - and am quite frankly loving it.

I’ve heard terrible things about the runtime startup speeds in the past. For me now it’s completely usable, but anecdotally Python is noticeably faster.

For me, the biggest issue is error message!

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Aug 3

I’ve switched to Julia now for a lot of the tasks you’ve mentioned, having previously used a combination of Python and R. Can really recommend it for most of these uses, but only used Quarto rather than Jupyter.

I’ve also thought about giving Rust a try, so looking forward to this thread!

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Julien Capin @ju-cap.bsky.social · Jul 17

You designed binders for your favourite protein and wish there was a way to experimentally screen them within 24h w/ only a set of pipettes and a plate reader?

Check out our Cell-Free 2-Hybrid approach (CF2H)

Full post: tinyurl.com/48cz5nb6

Preprint: www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

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Reposted by Angus Bucknell

Armin Djamei @effectomics.bsky.social · Jul 17

#2025ISMPMI Agnus Bucknell of the Talbot lab gives an exciting presentation to engineer fungal effectors recognizing immune sensors based on Pik1. Great and clear talk.

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Camilla Molinari @camilla-moli.bsky.social · Jul 17

#2025ISMPMI Want to know about transcriptional regulation driving pathogenicity in the blast fungus? Come to my poster (P-156) session today!
From 13:30 to 15:15 🌾

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Morgan Carter @morgancarterphd.bsky.social · Jul 17

@angusb.bsky.social wants to engineer plant resistance proteins (NLRs) from scratch.

Can we create protein domains to integrate into NLRs to catch pathogen effectors? New tech makes this possible now.

Chose Magnaporthe and Fusarium effectors as targets - many steps later, it worked!
#2025ISMPMI

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Jul 15

@adamrbentham.bsky.social

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Jul 15

Sounds great - see you all there!

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Morgan Carter @morgancarterphd.bsky.social · Jul 14

@mcdonaldmeganc.bsky.social presents on the ToxB fungal effector. Pacbio long-read sequencing ~doubles detection of transposons compared to short-read. Helpful for finding where the multiple copies of ToxB -flanked by TEs- are throughout the genome. Sometimes in tandem copies! #2025ISMPMI

Scientific presentation with a PowerPoint slide showing a global map with sample locations and ToxB genotype

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Josh Bennett @joshwbennett.bsky.social · Jul 14

Excited to attend my 1st ISMPMI conference, and present our work on a paired wheat CNL/MLKL receptor mechanism! 🌾

Come chat to me at my poster on Tuesday, P-050! 📜

If you miss my poster session, I will be talking in: Crop resistance genetics and genomics on Wednesday - 16:25-16:35!

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Jul 14

Big thanks to everyone who stopped by my poster today at #2025ISMPMI!

For those that missed it, you can check it out on Zenodo!

zenodo.org/records/1588...

Engineering new-to-nature immune sensors for novel recognition of Magnaporthe oryzae

Phytopathogenic fungi significantly impact global food security, causing up to 40% of annual crop yield losses worldwide. Alone, the blast fungus Magnaporthe oryzae has a global economic impact of $66...

zenodo.org

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Jul 13

Sounds great! Would love to join.

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Jul 9

Looking forward to #2025ISMPMI next week! I'll be presenting during the Engineering Plant-Microbe Traits session on Thursday, 17th.

I'll be sharing some exciting collaborative work which will also be showcased by me at P-427 (Session 1, 14th) and Yuxuan Xi at P-193 (Session 2, 16th)! Come say hi!

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Apr 29

Happy to have been featured in the Robigalia newsletter, led by @myrtlerustmartino.bsky.social. I would highly recommend checking out the newsletter for weekly plant pathology news and jobs/scholarships!

robigalia.beehiiv.com/p/robigalia-...

Robigalia Roundup #28

Photosynthetic performance of infected eucalypt clones, and meet Angus Bucknell

robigalia.beehiiv.com

Reposted by Angus Bucknell

Aaron Vogan @fungage-lab.bsky.social · Mar 7

We did it! We caught Starship #transposons moving between #fungal species in the lab, including between species separated by ~100my. We think Starships are a mediator of HGT in fungi, akin to conjugative elements in bacteria. Check out the preprint. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Illustration depicting the ways in which fungi can exchange genetic material with each other. Starship mediated HGT is confirmed experimentally in this preprint.

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Angus Bucknell @angusb.bsky.social · Dec 8

Opportunities to do some great science with a great supervisor!

Having worked in Megan’s lab for my Master’s research I can personally attest to how great of a PI she is!

Megan McDonald @mcdonaldmeganc.bsky.social · Dec 7

HI old friends! Finally took the leap here to say I have several open positions going in my lab at the moment (and more to come).
1) PhD studentship in collaboration with the Royal Horticultural Society (genomics)
2) Biochemistry Postdoc to understand how Starships move

Check out the links below!

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Mauricio Contreras @mpcontreras.bsky.social · Dec 4

If you're from the UK and are looking for a PhD, don't miss out on this fantastic opportunity! Amazing lab and amazing project!

Jiorgos Kourelis @jiorgoskourelis.bsky.social · Dec 4

📢 PhD Opportunity in my lab on Plant Immune Receptor Bioengineering at @imperiallifesci.bsky.social
🌱 Start: October 2025
📅 Deadline: 12th January 2025
🇬🇧 Open to UK students
💰 Fully funded
ℹ️ More info: tinyurl.com/w6ap9v9f
❗ #PlantImmunity #PlantPathology
🙏 Please share with interested candidates!

Bioengineering of plant NLR (nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat) immune receptors to enhance disease resistance at Imperial College London on FindAPhD.com

PhD Project - Bioengineering of plant NLR (nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat) immune receptors to enhance disease resistance at Imperial College London, listed on FindAPhD.com

www.findaphd.com

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Adam Bentham @adamrbentham.bsky.social · Dec 3

Come join us at the Centre Programmable Biological Matter 👇

Centre for Programmable Biological Matter @cpbm-heddlelab.bsky.social · Nov 26

🚀 We’re hiring! 🚀

We are seeking a passionate PDRA to lead an exciting AMS funded project in designing dynamic protein cage-based vaccines.

Utilise state-of-the-art biochemistry and deep learning tools to create systems with real-world impact.

durham.taleo.net/careersectio...