Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
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schmittwitt.bsky.social
Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
@schmittwitt.bsky.social
Cell signaling & metabolism & biosensors. Asst Prof. Cat mom. She/her. Los Angeles. Posts are my own views not my employers.
We’ve been using SAVEMONEY for a while and it works great!!
And save >80% on the cost by pooling 6 or more plasmids into a single sample using our free SAVEMONEY algorithm!

elifesciences.org/articles/88794

colab.research.google.com/github/Masaa...
February 15, 2026 at 4:41 AM
As a Culver City resident, I would argue the crime is there aren’t enough protected bike lanes. And I can’t decide which bakery to go to tomorrow morning.
“The first thing I thought was, ‘What is she talking about?’” said Bryan Fish, the vice mayor of Culver City, whom everyone calls Bubba but doesn’t look like someone whom everyone calls Bubba. “The only crime here,” he added, “is like the $18 strawberry at Erewhon.”

culver city, crime haven! lmaooo
Bondi Suggests Culver City Has a Crime Problem. Culver City Has a Problem With That.
www.nytimes.com
February 15, 2026 at 1:06 AM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
My quote of the day

Over and over, nature shows that it's a really tough adversary. That's why it's important that we invest in laboratories, disease detectives, research, mosquito control, the public health system around the world to find, stop, track, prevent health threats.

Tom Frieden
February 14, 2026 at 11:15 AM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
This is a genuinely huge, sweeping victory today for the University of California—or rather, for us, its faculty, acting through our faculty associations, while the UC itself maintained a strict policy of deer-in-headlights silence.

The Trump admin has given up its appeal of a powerful injunction:
Trump administration drops appeal of court order blocking $1.2-billion UCLA settlement
The Trump administration dropped its appeal of a major higher education case in which a federal judge blocked its $1.2-billion settlement proposal to UCLA over alleged civil rights violations. It will...
www.latimes.com
February 14, 2026 at 4:57 AM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
📣 First preprint from the TeSlaa lab 📣 We investigated how methyl-rich nutrient, choline, is used in the body and how systemic one-carbon metabolism responds to dietary methyl-donor deficiency.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
www.biorxiv.org
February 11, 2026 at 7:12 PM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
Rep. Delia Ramirez to DHS officials: "I have as much respect for you as I do for the last white men who put on masks to terrorize communities of color. I have no respect for the inheritors of the Klanhood and the slave patrol. Those activities were criminal and so are yours."
February 10, 2026 at 5:11 PM
I’m a white lady who grew up in the midwestern United States, lived in urban areas my entire adult life, has never been to Puerto Rico, and I knew that was sugar cane.
At the start of his Super Bowl performance, Bad Bunny appeared in a field of green grass wearing a jersey featuring the number “64.” Fans immediately started tossing out theories about what the number meant.
What Was the ‘Ocasio 64’ Reference on Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Look?
And where did his suit come from? The answers may surprise.
nyti.ms
February 9, 2026 at 7:27 AM
I turned on my tv, watched the fantastic concert Benito put on, and turned my TV back off.
February 9, 2026 at 1:38 AM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
Today our paper reporting on our new PINK1 biosensor is out! We are very excited about the future use of this tool to study PINK1 biology. Plasmids are available on Addgene & we are preparing a protocol paper. pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...
Visualizing PINK1 Activity Dynamics in Single Cells with a Phase Separation-Based Kinase Activity Reporter
Phosphatase and tensin homologue-induced kinase 1 (PINK1) is a serine/threonine kinase that plays roles in mitophagy, cell death, and regulation of cellular bioenergetics. Current approaches for study...
pubs.acs.org
February 3, 2026 at 9:29 PM
I have a student in my lab from the UK who has never heard of Groundhog Day. So, we spent the first 10 minutes of group meeting first explaining and then having her watch Punxsutawnwy Phil prognosticate. This student was deeply confused by everything we told her about the groundhog lore.
February 3, 2026 at 3:33 AM
I called my senators today. Their DC voicemails were not full. It took less than 5 minutes to tell them my thoughts. I encourage everyone else to do so as well.
January 27, 2026 at 5:32 PM
My family and friends in the Midwest and east coast have been sending me pictures of their dogs and kids playing in the snow and their significant others shoveling snow. I sent them this photo instead, of the view from LAX.
January 25, 2026 at 11:18 PM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
As a someone with a 33 year NIH-funded lab whose grant is supposed to be reviewed this week, shut NIH down if that is what's needed to end ICE terrorism. Innocent lives are more important 🧪
The Senate may choose to vote together on the DHS and LHHS bills. Thus, a filibuster on DHS may mean no funding for NIH. What my colleagues are saying:

“Shut it down, public health will understand. I’ll work without pay again.”
- anonymous NIHer
January 25, 2026 at 12:59 PM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
I’m not voting for one more dime for ICE or CBP.

These agents are provoking chaos and conflict in American cities and killing people in cold blood.
January 25, 2026 at 10:02 PM
I called my senators. I told them to vote No on the bill funding DHS. I told them that I don’t want the NIH to shut down, but I understand that the two funding bills are lumped together in a minibus appropriations. I told them it’s a sacrifice we can make because they’re murdering our neighbors.
January 25, 2026 at 9:59 PM
New from the lab: we report the development of our glutamine biosensor, iGlo, and use iGlo to study spatial and temporal dynamics of glutamine metabolism. Plasmids are being deposited with Addgene!
🌟New from the Schmitt Lab!🌟 We have developed a new cpEGFP-based biosensor for glutamine, iGlo. We use iGlo to measure gln uptake and the dynamics of gln production & use in cytoplasm & mito matrix. We also show the temporal crosstalk between gln & glucose metabolism. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Illuminating spatial dynamics of glutamine metabolism with a sensitive genetically encoded biosensor
Glutamine is the most abundant amino acid in serum, used as a key nutrient by cells for protein synthesis, energy production, carbon and nitrogen metabolism, and cellular redox balance. The use of glutamine in the cell is highly compartmentalized, but the dynamics of glutamine metabolism across organelles and individual cells are not fully understood. To illuminate subcellular glutamine dynamics, we developed an intracellular glutamine optical reporter, iGlo. We find iGlo is sensitive and specific for glutamine and can be used to measure glutamine uptake, production, and consumption with high spatiotemporal resolution in multiple cell types. Furthermore, multiplexed imaging of iGlo with a lactate biosensor in single cells reveals temporal crosstalk between glucose and glutamine metabolism to maintain energy homeostasis. Thus, iGlo enables the sensitive and precise study of compartmentalized glutamine dynamics and represents a new and enhanced tool for studying the spatiotemporal dynamics and regulation of metabolism. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. National Institutes of Health, https://ror.org/01cwqze88, T32GM145388, P30CA016042, R35GM138003, DP2GM154012 United States Department of Energy, https://ror.org/01bj3aw27, DE-FC02-02ER63421 UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, https://ror.org/0599cs764, Strategic Plan Aligned Grant, Graduate Research Award Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (United States), https://ror.org/02qenvm24, MET-000000000151
www.biorxiv.org
January 19, 2026 at 8:48 PM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
🌟New from the Schmitt Lab!🌟 We have developed a new cpEGFP-based biosensor for glutamine, iGlo. We use iGlo to measure gln uptake and the dynamics of gln production & use in cytoplasm & mito matrix. We also show the temporal crosstalk between gln & glucose metabolism. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Illuminating spatial dynamics of glutamine metabolism with a sensitive genetically encoded biosensor
Glutamine is the most abundant amino acid in serum, used as a key nutrient by cells for protein synthesis, energy production, carbon and nitrogen metabolism, and cellular redox balance. The use of glutamine in the cell is highly compartmentalized, but the dynamics of glutamine metabolism across organelles and individual cells are not fully understood. To illuminate subcellular glutamine dynamics, we developed an intracellular glutamine optical reporter, iGlo. We find iGlo is sensitive and specific for glutamine and can be used to measure glutamine uptake, production, and consumption with high spatiotemporal resolution in multiple cell types. Furthermore, multiplexed imaging of iGlo with a lactate biosensor in single cells reveals temporal crosstalk between glucose and glutamine metabolism to maintain energy homeostasis. Thus, iGlo enables the sensitive and precise study of compartmentalized glutamine dynamics and represents a new and enhanced tool for studying the spatiotemporal dynamics and regulation of metabolism. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. National Institutes of Health, https://ror.org/01cwqze88, T32GM145388, P30CA016042, R35GM138003, DP2GM154012 United States Department of Energy, https://ror.org/01bj3aw27, DE-FC02-02ER63421 UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, https://ror.org/0599cs764, Strategic Plan Aligned Grant, Graduate Research Award Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (United States), https://ror.org/02qenvm24, MET-000000000151
www.biorxiv.org
January 17, 2026 at 1:19 AM
One day Los Angeles will have the public transit we deserve.
January 15, 2026 at 6:01 PM
Reposted by Danielle L. Schmitt 🔬
Have you ever heard that women have more chances than men of getting grants or positions in academia? Of course you have, and here are my personal views on this. With the shocking revelation that no, it is NOT TRUE ! (1/n)
January 13, 2026 at 6:36 PM
My Alma mater, Ball State, just cut my minor (religious studies). Because of my minor I learned how to critically analyze text, and write well-researched papers, making me a better writer and scientist.
So, here it is. Thanks to a new state law that was NEVER DEBATED, Indiana University has committed itself to abolishing majors in African-American/African Diaspora Studies: American Studies; Art History; French; Italian; Religious Studies etc. DOZENS of majors. www.ipm.org/news-section...
Indiana public colleges cut almost 20% of degrees
Public Indiana colleges and universities have eliminated 19 percent of their degree programs to meet requirements added to the state’s budget, according to the Commission for Higher Education.
www.ipm.org
January 10, 2026 at 6:24 AM
I found a copycat Din Tai Fung cucumber salad recipe, and this might be the best thing I have ever made.
January 5, 2026 at 9:14 PM
Happy First Day of Winter Quarter to all who celebrate, iClicker crashed multiple times!
January 5, 2026 at 9:13 PM
Why the humanities and social sciences matter: I bought a book on the Monroe Doctrine written by a history professor to help me better understand and contextualize this moment. My home library is littered with books on history and cultural moments to help me better understand this current moment.
January 4, 2026 at 4:13 AM