Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Sep 4

Congratulations to graduate student Evan Wen on receiving and NIH F31 Fellowship Award for his project “Spatial diversity of GPCR-mediated ERK signaling and its role in cardiovascular disease”!

Photo of Evan outside the building our lab is housed in.

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Sep 2

Check out this recent paper from the lab, which sheds light on the physiological role of RIa phase separation, including its impact on insulin secretion! journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...
This work was led by project scientist Skott and former grad student Julia, part of our phase separation team!

Visualization of PKA regulatory subunit RIa (green) forming phase-separated condensates with the catalytic subunit (red) in MIN6 beta cells, revealing dynamic protein organization within the cytoplasm. Cell nuclei are in blue.

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Sep 2

And in case you haven’t seen it, here’s KINACT, the light-gated kinase integrator Wei pioneered in the lab! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Light-gated integrator for highlighting kinase activity in living cells - Nature Communications

Real-time biosensors have been developed for visualizing kinase activity dynamics, but they are confronted with many challenges. Here, the authors develop a light-gated KINACT integrator for post hoc ...

www.nature.com

Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Aug 29

Last week we celebrated Wei, @weilin1113.bsky.social, who has left the Zhang lab to start his independent career at Jiangnan University, focused on glycobiology. Wei has led numerous projects including the kinase integrator, KINACT. We’re proud of his work here and excited to see his next steps!

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Aug 25

Congratulations to Leah Bae, who successfully defended her master’s thesis last week! We’re very proud of her achievements in the lab and are excited for her next steps!

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Aug 11

Congratulations to Dr Ayse Sahan! Ayse defended her thesis this summer, and just finished up in the lab to move to her next adventure: a postdoc at UChicago! We miss Ayse already, but we’re very proud of what she’s accomplished here and excited to see her future work! #DragonKnife #PhDone

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Jul 2

Last week we said “au revoir” to Prof. Xavier Nicol, who joined us for his sabbatical over the last year. It’s been great to have him for discussions and ideas, and we’re excited to keep working with him on collaborations!

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Jun 9

Congratulations to Dr Emily Pool, who defended her thesis last week! She’s been an incredible asset to the lab, from her precision, to her mentorship, to the subject of her work, phase separation of PKA regulatory subunits. We’re so excited to see what she does next! Congrats, Dr. Pool!

Emily posing with the Dragon Knife about to cut a celebratory cake

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Reposted by Jin Zhang Lab

Weill Institute for Cell & Molecular Biology @weillinstitute.bsky.social · May 22

We are counting down the days to our Protein Science Symposium on June 10-12! Thrilled to be hosting our colleagues from WCM @weillcornell.bsky.social as well as keynote speakers Dr. Christopher Lima @christopherdlima.bsky.social and Dr. ‪Jin Zhang @jinzhanglab.bsky.social

3D rendering of a Ankyrin R adaptor protein

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · May 19

Three cakes! 🎂🎂🎂 The Zhang lab is full of May birthdays! Happy birthday to grad students Rosie and Max, and to postdoc Su-Hyun. (And belated birthdays to postdocs Nick and Ben, not part of today’s triple cake event, but celebrated nonetheless)
#dragonknife

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · May 9

Read a recap of the event and all the poster prize winners here!

today.ucsd.edu/story/self-a...

Self-assembling Molecules Take the Spotlight at Research Expo 2025

UC San Diego materials science and engineering Ph.D. student Liya Bi won the grand prize at the 43rd annual Jacobs School of Engineering Research Expo for his work studying how molecules organize them...

today.ucsd.edu

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · May 9

Congratulations to graduate student Rosie Zhou, who won the Shu and KC Chien Best Poster in Bioengineering award at the annual Jacobs School of Engineering Research Expo for her poster “Visualizing Protein Communication in Human Cells to Improve Cancer Treatment”
@jacobsschool.bsky.social

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · May 5

Graduate Student Yingqi Zhu won the Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program predoctoral research award. This grant will support her work on "Spatiotemporal cGAMP Signaling in Tobacco-Induced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Metastasis."

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · May 5

Postdoc Dr. Nick Bergkamp received the Rubicon Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Dutch Research Council, and the Van Zweiten PHD Thesis Award. The Rubicon Fellowship will support his project, "Location, location, location - Spatial Organization of AT1R-mediated ERK Signaling in the Diseased Heart."

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · May 5

Congratulations to two members of the lab on receiving fellowships and prizes! We're very proud of them, and these awards will support their work on signaling in heart disease and lung cancer, respectively.
Details in the thread for each of their projects. 🧵

Headshots of Dr. Nick Bergkamp and Yingqi Zhu, along with the titles of their awards and their projects. For Nick, the Rubicon Postdoctoral Fellowship- Dutch Research Council and Van Zwieten PHD Thesis Award, for the project "Location, location, location - Spatial organization of AT1R-Galphaq-mediated ERK signaling in the diseased heart." For Yingqi, The 2025 TRDRP Predoctoral Award for her project, Spatiotemporal cGAMP signaling in Tobacco-induced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Metastasis

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Apr 21

As Michelle mentioned, this paper was an incredible team effort, especially from two current graduate students, Samantha Sanchez and Xinchang He, who finished up many aspects of the project within the lab!

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Apr 21

So happy to see Michelle’s excellent paper from her postdoc with us now out! Her expertise allowed us to develop a new class of KARs with enhanced dynamic range and shifted to the far-red.

Everyone should keep an eye on her independent career, more incredible work is on the way!

Michelle Frei @michellefrei17.bsky.social · Apr 21

Happy to see my Postdoc work out @natbiotech.nature.com. Using HaloTag and synthetic fluorophores instead of FPs enables us to shift the spectral properties of kinase activity reporters (KARs) to the far-red 🔬. Huge thanks to everyone involved @jinzhanglab.bsky.social!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Far-red chemigenetic kinase biosensors enable multiplexed and super-resolved imaging of signaling networks - Nature Biotechnology

Far-red kinase biosensors are applied to image kinase signaling networks at super resolution.

www.nature.com

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Reposted by Jin Zhang Lab

Rita Strack @ritastrack.bsky.social · Apr 10

Your yearly reminder to acknowledge the core facilities you use and their staff scientists in your papers. These scientists are a crucial part of the scientific ecosystem and to continue to exist they need tangible credit for their work. Plus their associated expertise adds credibility to your work.

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Reposted by Jin Zhang Lab

jihwanjameslee.bsky.social @jihwanjameslee.bsky.social · Apr 9

🧵 1/6
Just dropped in @naturecomms.bsky.social

We’ve engineered the most photostable yellow fluorescent proteins (YFPs) to date—mGold2s and mGold2t—with up to 25× greater photostability than mVenus and mCitrine, without compromising brightness.

👇
🔗 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Mar 31

Congratulations to graduate student Ayse Sahan and former student Shawn Mingyuan Chen on the publication of their lipid biosensors in PNAS! With these sensors, we’re able to track PI(3,4)P2 and PIP3 signaling in the cell, and show the lysosome is a PIP3 signaling site. www.pnas.org/doi/full/10....

PNAS

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...

www.pnas.org

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Mar 10

Last week we celebrated 3 lab birthdays! Happy birthday to grad students Qian and Pal, and Project Scientist Scott! #DragonKnife

A photo of three people and three cakes. Qian is in the front, holding a serrated knife with dragon accents, poised over a fruit tart. Behind her and bending left is Pal, and behind him and bending right is Skott.

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Reposted by Jin Zhang Lab

JoAnn Trejo @joann-trejo.bsky.social · Feb 28

STAND UP FOR SCIENCE! Join us and thousands nationwide on Friday, March 7th at noon at the UC San Diego Geisel Library / Silent Tree

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Mar 3

On Friday we had our lab farewell party for postdoc @chrisqs.bsky.social, with lunch, cake, and lab sweater and mug! #DragonKnife Qi is moving on to a position in Dr. Diane Simeone’s lab at Moores Cancer Center. We’ve loved working with Qi, and are excited to see what he does going forward!

Qi holding the dragon knife, preparing to slice a cake.

Qi and Jin standing next to each other and smiling.

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Jin Zhang Lab @jinzhanglab.bsky.social · Feb 15

Two members of the lab, @ammgest.bsky.social and @anne-lyons-bioe.bsky.social will be at the Biophysical Society Meeting #bps2025 02/15 -02/19! Check out their posters on 02/18 from 1:45 to 2:45!

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Reposted by Jin Zhang Lab

Erik A. Rodriguez @erin-rod.bsky.social · Jan 31

Today, I would like to honor the memory of Roger Y. Tsien, born on February 1, 1952. His legacy lives with all who use his technologies, including calcium sensors, fluorescent proteins, the acetoxymethyl (AM) ester, & many more!

www.nature.com/articles/nme...

#FluorescenceFriday

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