Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Sep 3

There are no “O” amino acids you ding dongs

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Sep 2

The project has excellent lore. From contamination to a integrated tool to classify mobility, A-Dog (Arya to civilians) has found AMR gene have been increasing on MGEs likely due to the use of antibiotics. Some great graphs in here!

Michael Baym @baym.lol · Sep 1

What was antibiotic resistance like before we ever used antibiotics? How did we change what antibiotic resistance genes looked like over 100 years?

Our paper looking at resistance genes from a century of NCTC historical isolates now out in mGen:
www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/jour...

Genomic resistance in historical clinical isolates increased in frequency and mobility after the age of antibiotics

Antibiotic resistance is frequently observed shortly after the clinical introduction of an antibiotic. Whether and how frequently that resistance occurred before the introduction is harder to determin...

www.microbiologyresearch.org

1 1 6

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Aug 28

“I asked ChatGPT to generate” has replaced “Merriam Webster defines” as the new go to low effort introduction and PIs who start talks this way need to be made fun of

2

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Aug 8

When I was told I’d have a summer undergrad I couldn’t have imagined how lucky I would be. Hue has no tolerance for the easy way out and takes on new challenges with an infectious positivity. One day (hopefully🤞) someone will be just as lucky to have her as a grad student. We will miss you!

2 11

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Jul 6

Alternatively if you have a red sharpie hmu

3

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Jul 6

I apparently deleted a important “TnpA” label from my poster so now my week is ruined but if you want to help search for more mistakes and you are at the Microbial Populations GRC come see me Wednesday

1 7

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · May 24

Last summer I was lucky to attend the Woods Hole Microbial Diversity course and the most important thing I got out of it was meeting Liana. Her genuine curiosity and meticulousness really shine in this super cool story on introns (i.e. the coolest RNAs around). Excited to see what you do next!

Liana Merk @bacteriyay.bsky.social · May 24

(1/7) Very excited to share my first PhD preprint on the interactions of two of my favorite mobile genetic elements: phages and group II introns!

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Prevalence of Group II Introns in Phage Genomes

Although bacteriophage genomes are under strong selective pressure for high coding density, they are still frequently invaded by mobile genetic elements (MGEs). Group II introns are MGEs that reduce h...

www.biorxiv.org

1 6

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · May 22

It is getting weirder and weirder seeing faceless accounts accuse jewish professors of antisemitism for bemoaning their loss of funding

2

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · May 17

My advisor @baym.lol pointedly speaking with WBUR.

“I think that reason is a pretense. I think that this is an attack on Harvard as a symbol of academia in the United States.”

Lynn Jolicoeur @lynnjolicoeur.bsky.social · May 16

"I'm still in shock. I know that there have been political issues around Harvard in recent weeks, but antibiotic resistance isn't one of them." My conversation with Harvard microbiologist @baym.lol, one of many researchers there who just lost millions in fed. grants. www.wbur.org/news/2025/05...

Antibiotic research at Harvard lab threatened by federal funding cuts

Microbiologist Michael Baym studies antibiotic resistance at Harvard Medical School. He lost millions in federal funding this week.

www.wbur.org

1 15 55

Reposted by Everyone's least favorite lab mate

Michael Baym @baym.lol · May 13

Yesterday, the NIH R35 “Outstanding Investigator” grant to fund scientists in my lab studying antibiotic resistance was terminated for reasons not related to the content of the science, or any actions taken by me or members of my lab

A screenshot of the termination notice showing "Outstanding Investigator Grants"

A screenshot of the termination notice with "This award is terminated effective the date of this award, due to unsafe antisemitic actions that suggest the institution lacks concern for the safety and wellbeing of Jewish students." highlighted

140 580 880

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · May 9

During my rotation I got to work on this project and I immediately knew Soumya and Han were destined to be the future leaders of science and I would be a fool to pass up a chance to work with them. Super thankful to have met, and continue to get to hang with, you guys!

Nature Biotechnology @natbiotech.nature.com · May 7

Evolution-guided protein design of IscB for persistent epigenome editing in vivo - @zhangf.bsky.social @broadinstitute.org @hhmi.org go.nature.com/44XVBph

Evolution-guided protein design of IscB for persistent epigenome editing in vivo - Nature Biotechnology

A combination of engineering approaches is used to improve the function of IscB for a variety of editing activities in vivo.

go.nature.com

1 2

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

Reposting with an eye catching figure because I forgot

1 2

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

And thank you to Rob and Kathleen for taking a chance on me when no one else would, and to all the people I got to work with and learn from in the lab!

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

All in all a super fun project where I first truly learned independence. More importantly I got to work alongside @kyrellosi.bsky.social and @petermaxallen.bsky.social and watch them go from bleary eyed fresh from undergrad to fully trained scientists in their own right <3

1

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

In a humanized mouse model our VLPs effectively generated CAR T cells in vivo that were subsequently able to treat a B cell leukemia even better than traditional ex vivo CAR T cells.

1

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

Finally, we incorporated co-stimulatory ligands on the surface of the VLPs to create a T cell targeted VLP capable of selectively generating and activating CAR T cells in vitro.

1

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

So we spliced the measles envelope with that of the related Dolphin Morbillivirus to create a chimera that maintained fusogenicity with reduced response to measles vaccinated serum.

1

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

However, using the measles envelope for in vivo delivery poses a challenge as most of us are immunized against the virus (for the moment that is), so would be neutralized preventing the delivery of cargo. However other related viral envelopes evade anti measles antibodies.

1

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

But we found that scFvs overall impede surface expression and function of the MeV envelope. Nanobodies (i.e. llama antibodies) on the other hand can effectively re-target the MeV envelope without preventing expression.

1

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

We started with the measles virus envelope that can be redirected using to a receptor of choice with the addition of a targeting domain - usually an scFv.

1

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

In vivo generation of chimeric antigen receptor T cells using optimally retargeted and functionalized lentiviral vectors with reduced immune clearance

Despite striking efficacy against hematologic malignancies, the cost and complexity of CAR T manufacturing present significant barriers to broader patient access. Beyond manufacturing challenges, ex v...

www.biorxiv.org

1

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 24

Llamas, dolphins and measles? Oh my!

So thankful this story is finally breaking containment from my time in the Manguso Lab at the Broad. Using pieces from viruses and llamas we engineered selective cell specific viral like particles with reduced immunogenicity for in vivo gene delivery

1 1 3

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Apr 10

Like we needed another reason for sex…

But seriously this is a very cool result, surprisingly intuitive only after you read it. I interpret it is as sex delinking beneficial and deleterious mutations to enable greater adaptability. Shreyas worked super hard to figure this out, good work!

Shreyas Pai @theshreyaspai.bsky.social · Apr 2

Why is sex so common if it's so costly?
Super excited to share our new preprint “Sex decreases the pleiotropic costs of local adaptation”, where we bring a new angle to this age-old evolutionary question. Co-led by Parris Humphrey, in Michael Desai's lab. Short thread here: (1/n)

bioRxiv Evolutionary Biology @biorxiv-evobio.bsky.social · Mar 31

Sex decreases the pleiotropic costs of local adaptation https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.03.28.646016v1

2

Reposted by Everyone's least favorite lab mate

Type VI Sophia System @wheezenfeld.bsky.social · Apr 1

Woolly mice is bioweapon.

1 4

Everyone's least favorite lab mate @kepatitis-c.bsky.social · Feb 21

My scientific career changed the day I met Fernando and my faith in science restored. In a world dominated by sequencing and LLMs, this project shows how much biology is hidden in plain sight waiting for the right person to make the connection, a must read for any scientist!

Fernando Rossine @fernpizza.bsky.social · Feb 21

I'm so happy that I can finally share the results of my first postdoc paper with @baym.lol!!! Turns out plasmids are an amazing system to study multi-scale evolution and we can track within-cell and between-cell dynamics!
(1/n) www.biorxiv.org/content/earl...

Intracellular competition shapes plasmid population dynamics

Conflicts between levels of biological organization are central to evolution, from populations of multicellular organisms to selfish genetic elements in microbes. Plasmids are extrachromosomal, self-r...

www.biorxiv.org

4 12