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Javier Apfeld

@javierapfeld.bsky.social

3.2K followers 2.1K following 450 posts

Aging scientist. Worm expert. Community-engaged teacher. Lab at Northeastern University. I watch worms die to learn how to live. Lab: apfeldlab.mystrikingly.com ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-9897-5671

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · Nov 28

I am so happy this perspective was published today, on Thanksgiving day!! 🥂🦃

I reflect on how keeping in touch with a field I left behind long ago continues to bring me joy and fulfillment.

Keeping in touch with the road not taken

Nature Structural & Molecular Biology - Keeping in touch with the road not taken

www.nature.com

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 2d

I you have any duplicates of an original Benner or Sulston paper, I'd love to get one 🙋‍♂️🪱😍

Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Georgia Rapti @georgiarapti.bsky.social · 3d

Are you an early career scientist who wants to get specialist training in C. elegans model for your laboratory research? we co-organize again the EMBO C. elegans course! Do not miss applying!

EMBL Events @events.embl.org · 6d

🪱 Ready to take your C. elegans skills to the next level? Join our #EMBOCelegans course!

🎯 Learn hands-on genome editing, AI-driven imaging, microfluidics & uncover development, physiology & evolutionary insights.

📍 EMBL Heidelberg
📅 23 – 29 Mar 2026
👉 Apply by 8 Dec: s.embl.org/cel26-01-bl

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Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Max Heiman @heiman.bsky.social · 4d

Saturday morning, waiting for kid's soccer game, is a great time to indulge in the lowest form of humor:

LAB HAIKU!

1.
Does anyone know
whose PCR is in there?
BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.

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Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Celja Uebel @celjauebel.bsky.social · 6d

Hi fellow C. elegans scientists, I've made a few videos that may be of use for new trainees working in worm labs. Hoping to add more in the future, but figured I'd share this resource as is in case it's helpful :)
www.youtube.com/@Workingwith...

Working with C. elegans

This channel provides clear demonstrations of core C. elegans lab skills, including: recognizing life stages and common phenotypes, picking and manipulating worms, and maintaining healthy cultures. De...

www.youtube.com

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Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Doudna Lab @doudna-lab.bsky.social · 6d

"Jane Goodall showed us what a life in science could look like: rigorous discovery paired with fierce advocacy for what you study. She gave the world six decades of groundbreaking research on chimpanzees and their habitats, then turned that knowledge into a global movement for conservation." (1/2)

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 6d

Congrats Nick, Jeremy, and the whole team! 🎉✨️🪱

Reposted by Javier Apfeld

David Schoppik @schoppik.com · 6d

RIP Jane Goodall.

Sharing this photo of Skosha, one of the chimpanzees she studied. I took this photo in Gombe Stream, Tanzania, in November 2000.

#goodall #photography

A picture of a chimpanzee looking up and to the right

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Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Maureen Barr @barrlab.bsky.social · 7d

Worm peeps: nominate a newly minted PhD for the Sydney Brenner Thesis Award! #celegans

Genetics Society of America @genetics-gsa.bsky.social · 7d

📢 Deadline extended! Apply by Oct 3 for the 2025 Sydney Brenner Thesis Award—honoring outstanding theses in nematode biology (defended Oct 1, 2024–Sept 30, 2025).
Send in your nomination today! 🔗:

2025 Brenner Award Nomination

This nomination form is for the 2025 Brenner Award Nomination. Due: September 30th, 2025. Please do not include any information besides what is asked as a formal nominee form and recommendation…

buff.ly

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 8d

Very much so! And beautiful work too.

Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 8d

Wowza! I am so happy the thread was useful!

Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Oded Rechavi @odedrechavi.bsky.social · 9d

Got to love studies that were clearly conducted "for the love of the game" (“self-decapitating sea slugs”, “plants that see and use that for mimicry”, “worms that jump in the air”, aka papers you sometimes find in @currentbiology.bsky.social
) References to all of this bellow👇

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 13d

The seeds for the new cures that will suddenly surprise and inspire us decades from now are being planted by today's basic scientists.

This is why it is so important that funding agencies like #NIH and #NSF continue their long-term commitment to supporting basic science. /fin

Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 13d

Lin-4 is just one of the many seeds (whose stories I don't know as well) planted by basic scientists long ago, that grew into a piece of today's breakthrough therapy for Huntington's. 4/n

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 13d

Solving this enigma lead to the discovery that a tiny RNA binds to the untranslated region of a messenger RNA to regulate its activity.

This remained a novelty for many years, but later became the first example a widespread and conserved way in which organisms regulate gene expression. 3/n

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 13d

Case in point: today's microRNA therapy lowering the expression of a Huntington's-causing gene variant traces back to what what in the early 90s was an obscure enigma to basic scientists trying to understand why certain patterns of cell division occur at specific larval stages in a tiny worm 2/n

wbg.wormbook.org

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 13d

New cures feel sudden, but the seeds were planted decades ago by basic scientists.

Which seeds will turn into cures? Unpredictable looking forward, a straight line looking back. 🧪🧬 🧵

Huntington's disease successfully treated for first time

One of the most devastating diseases finally has a treatment that can slow its progression and transform lives, tearful doctors tell BBC.

www.bbc.com

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Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Matt Rockman @wormsrock.bsky.social · 13d

C. elegans is a real animal and we set out to understand how it comes to have its distinctive biogeography. Its ancestral center of diversity is in the higher elevation forests of Hawaii. Its closest relatives are spread across east Asia. Did they travel from Asia? [Preprint 🧵]

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Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Surojit Sural @surojitsural.bsky.social · 13d

Very excited to share this finding from my postdoctoral work that is now published in #ScienceAdvances. We show how the gut’s epithelium modifies enteric behaviors during nutritional adversity via distinct peptidergic signaling axes.

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Thread ⬇️

(1/n)

Gut epithelium modifies enteric behaviors during nutritional adversity via distinct peptidergic signaling axes

Gut epithelium modulates output from distinct enteric circuits by altering secretion of insulin and noninsulin peptides.

www.science.org

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 13d

Congrats Surojit and the whole team! The enteric nervous system is so interesting! I am very much looking forward to reading the paper.

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 16d

What movie do you consider "perfect"?

Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 16d

Congrats Needhi! Wonderful news! ✨️🪱🎉

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 19d

I am on their mailing list 😀

Upcoming Events

—> You can add yourself to the Ig Events mailing list. September 18, 2025, 6:00 pm, Thursday 35th First Annual Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, at Boston University in Boston, Massachusetts, USA — TICKE…

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 19d

I had a great time at the #IgNobel prize ceremony!

And what a show! Paper airplanes, an opera about digestion, all celebrating achievements that first make you laugh and then think.

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Javier Apfeld @javierapfeld.bsky.social · 28d

Congrats Callista! ✨️🪱🎉

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Reposted by Javier Apfeld

Max Heiman @heiman.bsky.social · Sep 7

New preprint!

How are developmental cycles coordinated across cell types?

It turns out that, like Geppetto's cuckoo clocks in the GIF below, individual cell types are each performing their own little crazy routine, but all in sync with each other.

a bunch of clocks are hanging on a wall including one that says ' 3:00 ' on it

ALT: a bunch of clocks are hanging on a wall including one that says ' 3:00 ' on it

media.tenor.com

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