Hajk-Georg Drost
@hajkdrost.bsky.social
Associate Professor of Digital Biology, @royalsociety.org Wolfson Fellow at School of Life Sciences @dundee.ac.uk, Fellow of @camphilsoc.bsky.social. Former Group Leader at @mpi-bio-fml.bsky.social and PostDoc at @cam.ac.uk and Trinity College Cambridge.
It would be exciting to study whether there are clear "causal" links between TE regulation and body plan formation in brown algae, where 'artificial' mobilisation of young TEs can drive innovation (and overcome constraints) in the formation of multicellular phenotypes.
October 2, 2025 at 9:06 AM
It would be exciting to study whether there are clear "causal" links between TE regulation and body plan formation in brown algae, where 'artificial' mobilisation of young TEs can drive innovation (and overcome constraints) in the formation of multicellular phenotypes.
Last year, our collaboration effort with @sodail.bsky.social and Susana Coelho highlighted that Brown Algae are a promising model system to study the evolution of multicellularity and emergence of embryogenesis as a constrained developmental process shaping body plans.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
October 2, 2025 at 9:06 AM
Last year, our collaboration effort with @sodail.bsky.social and Susana Coelho highlighted that Brown Algae are a promising model system to study the evolution of multicellularity and emergence of embryogenesis as a constrained developmental process shaping body plans.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Due to the curious nature of the [Ectocarpus] genome to select for young and potentially active TEs (majority DNA TEs), we did not manage to focus more on the retrotransposon biology of brown algae. Potentially active retrotransposons could be found with LTRpred:
joss.theoj.org/papers/10.21...
joss.theoj.org/papers/10.21...
LTRpred: de novo annotation of intact retrotransposons
Drost, H., (2020). LTRpred: de novo annotation of intact retrotransposons. Journal of Open Source Software, 5(50), 2170, https://doi.org/10.21105/joss.02170
joss.theoj.org
October 2, 2025 at 9:06 AM
Due to the curious nature of the [Ectocarpus] genome to select for young and potentially active TEs (majority DNA TEs), we did not manage to focus more on the retrotransposon biology of brown algae. Potentially active retrotransposons could be found with LTRpred:
joss.theoj.org/papers/10.21...
joss.theoj.org/papers/10.21...
Our main findings:
1) Ectocarpus mobiome retains mostly recent, evol. young transposons (TEs)
2) These primarily young TEs are regulated by small RNAs in absence of canonical DNA methylation
3) Particular TE enrichment along the sex chromosomes
4) Developmental regulation of TEs through small RNAs
1) Ectocarpus mobiome retains mostly recent, evol. young transposons (TEs)
2) These primarily young TEs are regulated by small RNAs in absence of canonical DNA methylation
3) Particular TE enrichment along the sex chromosomes
4) Developmental regulation of TEs through small RNAs
October 2, 2025 at 9:06 AM
Our main findings:
1) Ectocarpus mobiome retains mostly recent, evol. young transposons (TEs)
2) These primarily young TEs are regulated by small RNAs in absence of canonical DNA methylation
3) Particular TE enrichment along the sex chromosomes
4) Developmental regulation of TEs through small RNAs
1) Ectocarpus mobiome retains mostly recent, evol. young transposons (TEs)
2) These primarily young TEs are regulated by small RNAs in absence of canonical DNA methylation
3) Particular TE enrichment along the sex chromosomes
4) Developmental regulation of TEs through small RNAs