Catharina Merchante / Karen
banner
kmerchante.bsky.social
Catharina Merchante / Karen
@kmerchante.bsky.social
Tenured scientist @ihsmumacsic.bsky.social Curious about how plants adjust translation to adapt to their environment 👩🏻‍🔬🍀Science-Dog-📚-Travel-Nature-🌙-lover
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
🏆 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐓𝐏𝐉 𝐩𝐚𝐩𝐞𝐫 𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐳𝐞𝐬 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟒 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐨𝐮𝐭! 🏆
Read our EiC
@katherinedenby.bsky.social
´s editorial about the prizes and 2024 winners 👉 doi.org/10.1111/tpj.70567

Discover the winners of the six award categories in the thread below 🧵

🌟Congratulations to all authors! 🎉
Editorial for TPJ paper prizes 2024
Click on the article title to read more.
doi.org
November 13, 2025 at 4:51 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
Looking for 2 𝐑𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐡 𝐇𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐬 𝐄𝐝𝐢𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐬!
🌿 Join TPJ! You´ll:

🧬 Select standout TPJ papers
📰 Write short commentaries
🎨 Choose cover images
💬 Work with authors & SEB team

👉https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal/1365313x/homepage/rheditor
📩 Rosie Trice 𝐫𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐞@𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐞𝐲.𝐜𝐨𝐦
🗓️24Nov2025
October 28, 2025 at 6:08 PM
Join us in beautiful Málaga 😊
𝐏𝐆𝐑𝐏𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟔 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐚 𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐨! 🎉
Kudos to the artist: @laura-ah.bsky.social

Website and registration info coming VERY soon — how exciting! 🤩
November 6, 2025 at 9:47 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
November 4, 2025 at 1:52 PM
Libro precioso
November 2, 2025 at 11:49 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
📢 Abstract submission is now OPEN!
Join us for the 77th International Symposium on Crop Protection (ISCP 2026) 🪴
🗓️ 19 May 2026 | Ghent University, Belgium

🔗 Details here: www.ugent.be/bw/plants-an...

#ISCP2026 #GhentUniversity #CropProtection #PlantHealth #SustainableAgriculture #Research
International Symposium on Crop Protection
The 76th International Symposium on Crop Protection will take place on Tuesday 20 May 2025. The official language of the Symposium is English.
www.ugent.be
November 1, 2025 at 12:42 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
🌱 "Go barefoot in the sun. Sit close to trees. Listen to the wind. And remember who you actually are. This was your ancestor's therapy." —Nicole Le Pera
October 28, 2025 at 11:00 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
Rosa Lozano-Durán (@geminiteamlab.bsky.social), one of the newly elected EMBO members 2025, has introduced her research at the @embo.org Members' Meeting in Heidelberg.
We are so proud of you!
#plantsci
October 24, 2025 at 6:24 PM
😲 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐬𝐲𝐦𝐛𝐢𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐜 𝐨𝐫𝐠𝐚𝐧!

Female Japanese Dinidorid stinkbugs have a surprise: a newly discovered symbiotic organ. Inside, they grow fungi that they rub onto their eggs, forming a protective blanket that shields the clutch from parasitic wasps
🪲🐝

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Defensive fungal symbiosis on insect hindlegs
Dinidorid stinkbugs were reported to possess a conspicuous tympanal organ on female hindlegs. In this study, we show that this organ is specialized to retain microbial symbionts rather than to perceiv...
www.science.org
October 23, 2025 at 8:30 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
🚨 SPECIAL ISSUE - CLOSING SOON 🚨

🌿 Plant Proteostasis 🌿

📝 Edited by Pablo Manavella & Catharina Merchante

📅 Deadline: 30 November 2025

📄 Manuscripts welcomed, please contact us 👉 bit.ly/JXBissues

#JXBspecialissues #PlantScience 🧪
@sebiology.bsky.social @kmerchante.bsky.social
** UPCOMING SPECIAL ISSUE **

Plant Proteostasis

Editors: Pablo Manavella & Catharina Merchante

Deadline: 30th Nov '25

Manuscripts of any format welcomed, please contact the office (bit.ly/JXBissues)

#JXBspecialissues 🌱 🌿 🧪 #plantscience

@kmerchante.bsky.social @sebiology.bsky.social

(1/2)
October 20, 2025 at 10:52 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
People are thinking about what is not happening almost as often as they are thinking about what is.

Doing so typically makes them unhappy.

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
October 13, 2025 at 2:33 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
Splicing was discovered in adenoviruses, but was thought to be only anecdotal in plant viruses... We may need to revisit plant viral transcriptomes and proteomes!
How do geminiviruses maximize their limited coding capacity? Our recent preprint uncovers splicing of viral transcripts as one more strategy used by this viral family. We show that RNA splicing is prevalent in the geminivirus TYLCV — and required for infectivity! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Pervasive splicing in a plant DNA virus
Viruses maximize their limited coding space through strategies that increase transcript and protein diversity. In mammalian viruses, splicing is a well-established mechanism for proteome expansion, ye...
www.biorxiv.org
October 3, 2025 at 8:57 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
How do geminiviruses maximize their limited coding capacity? Our recent preprint uncovers splicing of viral transcripts as one more strategy used by this viral family. We show that RNA splicing is prevalent in the geminivirus TYLCV — and required for infectivity! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Pervasive splicing in a plant DNA virus
Viruses maximize their limited coding space through strategies that increase transcript and protein diversity. In mammalian viruses, splicing is a well-established mechanism for proteome expansion, ye...
www.biorxiv.org
October 3, 2025 at 1:13 PM
I had the incredible luck of attending the seminar that Jane Goodall gave in Malaga this spring.
She truly knew how to communicate science and how to engage people. Her passion was contagious.
RIP.
🩷🐒

Jane Goodall’s legacy: three ways she changed science www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Jane Goodall’s legacy: three ways she changed science
The primatologist challenged what it meant to be a scientist.
www.nature.com
October 2, 2025 at 4:42 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
RIP Jane Goodall. She was such an inspiration & role model. May her memory be a blessing 🧪👩‍🔬 #HPS
October 1, 2025 at 6:29 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
Con profunda tristeza, lamentamos compartir que nuestra querida fundadora, la Dra. Jane Goodall, ha fallecido por causas naturales hoy, a los 91 años de edad, en California, donde se encontraba en gira por los Estados Unidos.
October 1, 2025 at 7:22 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
Hoy ha sido el #DíaMundialDeLaTraducción, así que debemos felicitar a quien mejor lo está haciendo... desde hace unos 3.800 millones de años: el #ribosoma.
September 30, 2025 at 8:48 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
I'm making a collage of Arabidopsis habitats for a seminar. If you have photos to share, such as these iconic ones from @mexpositoalonso.bsky.social & @coevolution.bsky.social, please send to weigel@tue.mpg.de. Please let me also know how to attribute them. 🙏🙏🙏🙏
September 14, 2025 at 9:52 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
👏 Congratulations to Pathy Kibungu on our new paper in Human Ecology on the characterization and conservation challenges of plant resources in the DRC!
🌿 709 species identified in Mbanza-Ngungu
💊 35% medicinal, many rare
⚠️ Urgent conservation needed
🔗 doi.org/10.1007/s107...
Ecofloristic Characterization and Conservation Challenges of Medicinal Plant Resources and Knowledge in Mbanza-Ngungu, Kongo-Central Province (DR Congo) - Human Ecology
We aim to evaluate the composition, distribution, and availability of key medicinal plants in their natural habitats, assess their conservation status, and explore species interactions that are vital ...
doi.org
September 14, 2025 at 7:43 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
🌱 ¿Quieres realizar tu tesis doctoral desarrollando un atlas del transcriptoma single-cell y la caracterización funcional de reguladores del desarrollo y maduración del fruto de fresa?

Ofrecemos un contrato de la convocatoria FPI asociado al proyecto PID2024-155863OB-I00
September 10, 2025 at 11:13 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
🎓 Today our PhD researcher Carolina Huércano made her PhD defense at the IHSM La Mayora (Teatinos).

✨ Congratulations, Carolina! ✨

#PhD #PHDdefense
September 5, 2025 at 11:28 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
Our new paper is out in New Phytologist! We describe how the Ralstonia solanacearum effector RipAV suppresses plant immunity by directly interfering with key defense regulators. 🧵👇
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
The Ralstonia solanacearum effector RipAV targets plant U‐box proteins and induces proteasomal‐dependent degradation of BIK1
Plants have developed a complex immune system to detect and respond to invading pathogens. A critical aspect of this defense relies on regulatory mechanisms that control the activation of immune res...
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
September 2, 2025 at 7:58 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
🌱Big news
𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐰𝐞𝐛𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐫 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 with @globalplantgpc.bsky.social to highlight TPJ papers

1st features researchers from our 𝑆𝐼 𝑜𝑛 𝑃𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑡 𝐸𝑛𝑔𝑖𝑛𝑒𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 🌱🧬
🗓️Sept 29 ⏰17:00 CEST
🎙️Hosted by EiC @katherinedenby.bsky.social
🔗 Register us02web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

SI onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/toc/10.1...
Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: Engineering – Advances, Bottlenecks, and Promise. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar.
This webinar is the 1st in a series together with "The Plant Journal" Join us for a webinar hosted in collaboration between The Global Plant Council and the "The Plant Journal", exploring the latest ...
us02web.zoom.us
September 4, 2025 at 9:38 AM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
We are hiring a PhD student (FPI) for the
🧬🌱Plant Epitranscriptomics Lab 🧬🌱
at IHSM La Mayora (UMA-CSIC) ‪@ihsmumacsic.bsky.social‬‬
to study the role of m6A in axillary bud dormancy

Candidates send CV and motivation letter to:
✉️laura.arribas@csic.es
📆 until Sep 30th
September 3, 2025 at 3:46 PM
Reposted by Catharina Merchante / Karen
🌟 𝐅𝐢𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐟𝐢𝐫𝐦𝐞𝐝 𝐤𝐞𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞 𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐫𝐬 🗣️

Excited to share the first members of our keynote lineup!
🔹 Federico Ariel
🔹 Brian Gregory
🔹 Polly Hsu @pollyhsulab.bsky.social
🔹 Rosa Lozano-Durán @geminiteamlab.bsky.social
🔹 Hervé Vaucheret

More speakers and more info coming soon!
August 30, 2025 at 12:12 PM