Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Ander Movilla @andermovilla.bsky.social · 1d

Very exciting opportunity for those with a quantitative background and interested in epigenetics / gene regulation. Highly collaborative environment!

John Innes Centre @johninnescentre.bsky.social · 2d

VACANCY - We have an opportunity for a Postdoctoral Researcher to join the Howard Group, working to develop computational models of epigenetic dynamics in the Polycomb system.

www.jic.ac.uk/vacancies/po...

Closing date - 9 November 2025
Salary - £37,500 - £45,350
Contract - 36 months, full-time

Postdoctoral Researcher (Howard Group) | John Innes Centre

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Postdoctoral Researcher to join the Howard Group at the John Innes Centre, working on cutting-edge science in the field of Computational and Systems Biology.

www.jic.ac.uk

8 8

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · 1d

If you are a computational biologist interested in how chromatin states are established and maintained to regulate transcription, this is the dream job for you! This will be in close collaboration with the Klose lab in Oxford and we have a lot of cool projects you can get involved in. Apply!

John Innes Centre @johninnescentre.bsky.social · 2d

VACANCY - We have an opportunity for a Postdoctoral Researcher to join the Howard Group, working to develop computational models of epigenetic dynamics in the Polycomb system.

www.jic.ac.uk/vacancies/po...

Closing date - 9 November 2025
Salary - £37,500 - £45,350
Contract - 36 months, full-time

Postdoctoral Researcher (Howard Group) | John Innes Centre

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Postdoctoral Researcher to join the Howard Group at the John Innes Centre, working on cutting-edge science in the field of Computational and Systems Biology.

www.jic.ac.uk

8 14

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · 19d

On my way back from the Transcription and Chromatin UK meeting in Manchester. It was a great meeting with lots of cool science discussed! At dinner we were trying to guess where it will be next year - Edinburgh or Birmingham? 😀 @biochemsoc.bsky.social #BiochemEvent

1 1 10

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Fena Ochs @fenaochs.bsky.social · 27d

Delighted to share our lab's first preprint identifying DDIAS as a mitotic DNA repair protein. Great collaboration with the @andrewblackford.bsky.social, @tcr-miller.bsky.social and @profstewartlab.bsky.social labs, and many more. Read the paper here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

DDIAS is a single-stranded DNA-binding effector of the TOPBP1-CIP2A complex in mitosis

DNA double-strand breaks and unresolved DNA replication intermediates are particularly dangerous during mitosis. Paradoxically, cells inactivate canonical DNA repair mechanisms during chromosome segre...

www.biorxiv.org

6 23

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · 29d

Double celebration on our floor @oxfordbiochemistry.bsky.social with @guifengwei.bsky.social from the Brockdorff lab and Dounia and Sherry from Fisher lab having their papers published today! And I hear there is more to come...

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

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

m6A and the NEXT complex direct Xist RNA turnover and X-inactivation dynamics - Nature Structural & Molecular Biology

Wei et al. show that the primary function of m6A on the nuclear long noncoding RNA Xist, a master regulator of X inactivation, is to promote RNA degradation. Xist turnover is mediated by the nuclear e...

www.nature.com

9 25

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · 29d

Guifeng's study on the role of m6A on Xist is published today! Have a read!

Guifeng Wei @guifengwei.bsky.social · 29d

Thrilled to share our new Brockdorff lab paper at NSMB: we show that the primary role of m6A RNA modification on Xist is to promote RNA degradation. Xist turnover is mediated by the NEXT complex, not PAXT, and is independent of the m6A reader YTHDC1. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

m6A and the NEXT complex direct Xist RNA turnover and X-inactivation dynamics - Nature Structural & Molecular Biology

Wei et al. show that the primary function of m6A on the nuclear long noncoding RNA Xist, a master regulator of X inactivation, is to promote RNA degradation. Xist turnover is mediated by the nuclear e...

www.nature.com

2

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · Sep 4

Congratulations, Hanneke!

2

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

FragileNucleosome @fnucleosome.bsky.social · Sep 1

We're super excited to announce the entire lineup for the Fall season of Fragile Nucleosome Seminars, starting on Sept 10th at 1200 EDT / 1600 UTC with @gracebower.bsky.social and @creminslab.bsky.social!

register here for the entire series: us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

Fragile Nucleosome Fall Seminars:
September 10 Grace Bower, Kvon Lab @ UC Irvine, USA
Jennifer Phillips-Cremins, UPenn, USA

September 24 Ali Wilkening, Sanulli Lab @ Stanford, USA
Juanma Schvartzman, Columbia University, USA

October 8 Sanim Rahman, Greenberg Lab @ UPenn, USA
Alex Federation, Talus Bio, USA

October 22 Alice Laigle, Croll Lab @ University of Neuchâtel, Switzerland
Seungsoo Kim, UC Irvine, USA

November 5 Hannah Long, University of Edinburgh, UK
Jeff Vierstra, Altius Institute, USA

November 19 Ishtiaque Hossain, Pastor Lab @ McGill, Canada
Sarah Teichmann, University of Cambridge, UK

December 3 María Mariner Faulí, Rada Iglesias Lab @ IBBTEC, Spain
Jonathan Henninger, Carnegie Mellon, USA

December 17 Rebecca Berrens, Oxford University, UK
Jean-Benoit Lalanne, University of Montreal, Canada

36 66

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · Sep 1

Great lab doing fun science! Come and join our lab neighbours in Oxford!

Tobias Warnecke @tobiaswarnecke.bsky.social · Sep 1

Please re-post: If you know (or are!) somebody who might fancy doing a PhD (Oct 2026 start) in my group @oxfordbiochemistry.bsky.social, working on chromatin evolution in prokaryotes (or other things we're interested in), please have a look at www.bioch.ox.ac.uk/supervisors-...

Supervisors and Projects

www.bioch.ox.ac.uk

1 1

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Stefan Schoenfelder @stefanschoenfelder.bsky.social · Jul 22

🚨 New paper alert 🚨
I am excited to share our new work on epigenetic enhancer priming in early mammalian development
genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....
Fantastic collaboration with Wolf Reik’s team, with key contributions from many others, led by the excellent Chris Todd.
Short 🧵

Epigenetic priming of mammalian embryonic enhancer elements coordinates developmental gene networks - Genome Biology

Background Embryonic development requires the accurate spatiotemporal execution of cell lineage-specific gene expression programs, which are controlled by transcriptional enhancers. Developmental enha...

genomebiology.biomedcentral.com

1 23 40

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Hanneke Vlaming @hannekevlaming.bsky.social · Jul 18

Happy to share this paper! We uncovered that good 5' splice sites protect against ZC3H4/Restrictor's promiscuous role, and that its role is to suppress elongation and indirectly cause termination. Looking forward to learning more about this protein in the future!

Genes & Development @genesdev.bsky.social · Jul 10

In this study, Mimoso et al. show that Restrictor serves as a transcriptional safeguard that suppresses the spurious transcription of non-coding RNAs, while preserving mRNA transcription.

Learn more here:
➡️ tinyurl.com/gd352654

3 10 32

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Rebecca Berrens @rberrens.bsky.social · Jul 16

Very happy to share our protocols paper for CELLO-seq. This will make single cell long read RNA-seq more accessible and provides analysis guidelines. We hope this helps the #transposon #TEsky community and folks working on #singleCell isoform and allelic #gene expression. doi.org/10.1038/s415...

Long-read RNA sequencing of transposable elements from single cells using CELLO-seq - Nature Protocols

Single-cell long-read RNA sequencing enables the high-fidelity mapping of single-cell expression data from highly sequence-similar transposable elements to unique genomic loci by correcting errors fro...

doi.org

8 38 100

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Rob Klose @robklose.bsky.social · Jul 15

My wonderful colleage Colin Kleanthous is raising money for the MND association. Please support Colin in this worthy endeavor! www.justgiving.com/page/colin-k...
(Please repost!)

Colin Kleanthous' fundraiser for Motor Neurone Disease Association

Help Colin Kleanthous raise money to support Motor Neurone Disease Association

www.justgiving.com

11 12

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Biochemical Society @biochemsoc.bsky.social · Jun 26

Taking place on 17-19 September 2025, Transcription and Chromatin UK will showcase cutting-edge research and is a ‘mustattend’ for anyone within the transcription and epigenetics community🧪. Register now: www.eventsforce.net/biochemsoc/2...

Transcription and Chromatin UK
Manchester, UK
17-19 September 2025
Earlybird deadline: 17 July 2025

11 22

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · Jun 24

Check out the work of the freshly baked Dr @flavia-con.bsky.social from the Brockdorff lab. Flavia used live-cell single molecular imaging to understand how SMCHD1 interacts with chromatin and is involved in silencing of Xi www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

www.biorxiv.org

2 5

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Stefan Schoenfelder @stefanschoenfelder.bsky.social · Jun 2

Delighted & excited to share our latest preprint on non-canonical enhancers in human pluripotent stem cells, the result of a fantastic and fun collaboration with @guenesdoganlab.bsky.social‬:
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

🧵 below

Non-canonical enhancers control gene expression and cell fate in human pluripotent stem cells

Enhancers are key gene regulatory elements that ensure the precise spatiotemporal execution of developmental gene expression programmes. However recent findings indicate that approaches to identify en...

www.biorxiv.org

4 45 110

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · May 16

Well done, Komal! Totally deserved- beautiful story and a beautiful poster. So nice to see you there!

1 1

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · May 9

An emotional day today @oxfordbiochemistry.bsky.social where leaders in the cell cycle field gathered to celebrate the life of Bela Novak and the huge impact he had on their work! www.bioch.ox.ac.uk/article/prof...

Professor Bela Novak (1956–2025): A Life of Scientific Discovery in Numbers

It is with profound sorrow that we announce the passing of Professor Béla Novák

www.bioch.ox.ac.uk

7 18

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · May 2

Not sure these would work with trizol?...plus will be expensive.

1

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · May 1

Ah Hannah, next time you should drop by 😊

1

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · Apr 28

I'm immensely grateful to the person who found my lost rail card (annual £££!) and went through all the trouble of finding me, contacting me and returning it to me in time for my morning commute. Kindness will prevail!

5

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Peter Sarkies @psarkies.bsky.social · Mar 31

Great day of science at the annual @oxfordbiochemistry.bsky.social retreat at St Catz in Oxford! A showcase of research from across the range of scales and topics, mostly students and postdocs presenting. Inspiring to be part of such a great community!

2 10

Emilia Dimitrova @edimitrova.bsky.social · Apr 1

Already looking forward! Such a fun meeting!

Pradeepa Madapura @pradeepmadapura.bsky.social · Apr 1

Chromatin & transcription meeting is back again. Register your interest here www.biochemistry.org/events-and-t...

1

Reposted by Emilia Dimitrova

Matt Higgins @parasitematt.bsky.social · Feb 25

A brilliant, kind, funny colleague gone too soon. We will miss you Bela.
www.merton.ox.ac.uk/news/remembe...

Remembering Professor Béla Novák 1956 - 2025

With great sadness, we announce the loss of Professor Béla Novák.

www.merton.ox.ac.uk

8 20