Maite Colinas
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maitecolinas.bsky.social
Maite Colinas
@maitecolinas.bsky.social
1.6K followers 1.2K following 100 posts
🌱, natural products, enzymes, regulation, evolution, not necessarily in this order. Currently Project Group Leader at Department of Natural Product Biosynthesis @mpi-ce.bsky.social. Former MSCA fellow. Always daydreamer.(she/her)
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maitecolinas.bsky.social
Maite Colinas @maitecolinas.bsky.social · Oct 3
Very exciting to finally see our iridoid cyclase ICYC online @natplants.nature.com!
A joined effort with Robin Buell’s lab with Josh Wood generating snRNA-seq, and my student Chloée Tymen performing the initial experiment.
#natprod
#PlantScience
@mpi-ce.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Discovery of iridoid cyclase completes the iridoid pathway in asterids - Nature Plants
Iridoids are terpenoid metabolites found in thousands of plants. Using single-cell transcriptomics, the authors discovered an unexpected enzyme that has been neofunctionalized to catalyse the cyclization required to form the iridoid scaffold.
www.nature.com
Reposted by Maite Colinas
claudiavickers.bsky.social
Our new paper is out: we present a quantitative framework to assess how (bio)tech interventions in plant agriculture could meaningfully contribute to climate mitigation. This may be the most important paper I ever publish #SyntheticBiology #ClimateAction #Agriculture #Biochar doi.org/10.1093/plph...
Harnessing plant agriculture to mitigate climate change: A framework to evaluate synthetic biology (and other) interventions
The scale of plant agriculture can be used to mitigate climate change, and meaningful targets (synthetic biology and comparators) can be selected to increa
doi.org
November 27, 2025 at 5:16 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
mehta-lab.com
Why do our leaders love the Matthew Effect so effing much?
katherinestiles.org Katherine Stiles @katherinestiles.org · 4d
· #AcademicSky ·
The European Research Council is launching €7m Plus Grants for ambitious, long‑term research — open to researchers at any career stage but limited to about 30 awards; current ERC grantees and applicants are ineligible, reports @clanicholson.bsky.social.
ERC’s new €7m Plus Grants open to researchers at any career stage - Research Professional News
European Research Council president describes scheme as part attempt to lure US talent
www.researchprofessionalnews.com
November 29, 2025 at 1:17 PM
maitecolinas.bsky.social
How to stop the revolving door of German academia www.nature.com/articles/d41...
How to stop the revolving door of German academia
Germany is one of the most popular destinations for students and scholars worldwide, but those pursuing academic careers face significant hurdles to success.
www.nature.com
November 28, 2025 at 8:28 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
globalplantgpc.bsky.social
Matching gene expression to metabolite production in single plant cells

Integrated method reveals how genes drive metabolite production, uncovers cell types, & could speed up the development of plant-based medicines.

buff.ly/SrbYjZ7 via @mpi-ce.bsky.social #PlantScience
Image: From left to right: Moonyoung Kang, Lorenzo Caputi, Sarah O’Connor and Hai Anh Vu, holding Catharanthus roseus plants, are standing next to a liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS) system. This system is used to analyze metabolites in single cells. Credit: Angela Overmeyer
November 26, 2025 at 8:47 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
apmweber.bsky.social
AI model Helixer predicts eukaryotic genes ab initio, directly from a plain text FASTA file.

No RNA-seq.
No protein homology.
No repeats, hints, or curated evidence.

Raw genome → accurate gene models.
Deep learning + HMM, published in @natmethods.nature.com

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Helixer: ab initio prediction of primary eukaryotic gene models combining deep learning and a hidden Markov model - Nature Methods
By leveraging both deep learning and hidden Markov models, Helixer achieves broad taxonomic coverage for ab initio gene annotation of eukaryotic genomes from fungi, plants, vertebrates and invertebrat...
www.nature.com
November 26, 2025 at 6:00 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
hormiga.bsky.social
You know those labs that keep harming students, again and again? Some reflections on why it's so hard to stop this from happening and where our responsibilities lie.

scienceforeveryone.science/bad-mentors-... 🧪
Bad mentors hurt people
What to do about bad mentors?
scienceforeveryone.science
November 25, 2025 at 6:38 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
sev1panier.bsky.social
Did you ever wonder how #Solanum plants evolved quantitative disease resistance/ #QDR?
I am really excited to share our recently published manuscript, where we tried to contribute to addressing this question!

🌱https://tinyurl.com/2vz23ck6
Co-option of transcription factors drives evolution of quantitative disease resistance against a necrotrophic pathogen
Quantitative disease resistance in a wild tomato genotype evolved through species-specific regulatory network rewiring, with an ancient transcription facto
tinyurl.com
November 21, 2025 at 9:00 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
jourdainlab.bsky.social
We are hiring a postdoc! 🧪
▶️ Project: nucleotide metabolism (genomics & biochemistry)
▶️ Start date: spring 2026 (flexible)
▶️ More info and application: tinyurl.com/3kjrbb2x
Please share 🌏

@fbm-unil.bsky.social @dib-unil.bsky.social @unil.bsky.social @snsf.ch
Career Opportunities: Postdoctoral position in cellular metabolism (22584)
tinyurl.com
November 20, 2025 at 6:26 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
mads100tist.bsky.social
"Postdoc in the job market"
A headline: Scientists have discovered a 'third state' between life and death
November 16, 2025 at 7:52 PM
maitecolinas.bsky.social
#natprod
November 13, 2025 at 8:55 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
nature.com
Getting Rosalind Franklin’s story right is crucial, because she has become a role model for women going into science

www.nature.com/articles/d41...
What Rosalind Franklin truly contributed to the discovery of DNA’s structure
Franklin was no victim in how the DNA double helix was solved. An overlooked letter and an unpublished news article, both written in 1953, reveal that she was an equal player.
www.nature.com
November 10, 2025 at 9:44 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
globalplantgpc.bsky.social
Final step in the biosynthesis of iridoids elucidated

Iridoid-producing plants use a cyclase to synthesize the characteristic double-ring structure of this important class of defense compounds and medically relevant substances

buff.ly/kqtPHl2 via @maxplanck.de #PlantScience #Plants #Science
Image: The plant species that produce iridoids and possess a gene copy of the cyclase include (top row from left to right) icepac Carapichea ipecacuanha, fever tree (Cinchona pubescens), golden trumpet (Allamanda cathartica), princess tree (Paulownia tomentosa), (bottom row, from left to right) Carolina jessamine (Gelsemium sempervirens), Madagascar periwinkle (Catharanthus roseus), strychnine tree (Strychnos nux-vomica), and devil pepper (Rauvolfia tetraphylla). Credit: Eva Rothe, greenhouse of the MPI f. Chemical Ecology (ipecac plant: Maite Colinas)
November 4, 2025 at 8:00 AM
maitecolinas.bsky.social
#natprod
November 3, 2025 at 11:32 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
theplantjournal.bsky.social
In conversation with 𝐃𝐫. 𝐁𝐞𝐫𝐨𝐧𝐝𝐚 𝐌𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐠𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐲
Prof of Biology. Grinnell College, USA.

“Thriving can’t be measured by productivity.” Prof. Montgomery reimagines success through inclusion, connection and care 🌱

@berondam.bsky.social
by @luisdeluna.bsky.social

Read it here: doi.org/10.1111/tpj.70513
November 1, 2025 at 4:44 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
elenadelpup.bsky.social
🌱plantiSMASH 2.0💥 is now live!

I’m very excited to share that the 2.0 version of plantiSMASH is now available online and as a preprint on bioRxiv 📄https://lnkd.in/dN4F56pf

🌱 What’s new in plantiSMASH 2.0? ⬇️
biorxivpreprint.bsky.social bioRxivpreprint @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social · Oct 29
plantiSMASH 2.0: improvements to detection, annotation, and prioritization of plant biosynthetic gene clusters https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.10.28.683968v1
October 29, 2025 at 1:23 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
mykang.bsky.social
Excited to see our paper online! We combined scMS and scRNA-seq from the same plant cells 🌱 — a step toward true single-cell multi-omics in plants.
Overview 👇
October 27, 2025 at 6:32 PM
maitecolinas.bsky.social
a nice story for the #natprod feed
masscheleinlab.bsky.social Masschelein Lab @masscheleinlab.bsky.social · Oct 27
Polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA) synthase enzymes turn out to be far more versatile than we ever imagined! In our new preprint, we reveal a largely untapped biosynthetic space where they team up with PKSs and NRPSs to create new types of bioactive amphiphilic metabolites.
👉http://bit.ly/4hzUUak
Charting the biosynthetic landscape of hybrid polyketide-nonribosomal peptide-specialized lipids
Polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA) synthase-like enzymes are best known for their role in membrane lipid biosynthesis in marine bacteria, but have also been repurposed for the assembly of specialized l...
bit.ly
October 27, 2025 at 1:15 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
chenxinli2.bsky.social
Single cell metabolomics (LC-MS) and RNA-seq from the same cell.

From: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
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
October 24, 2025 at 8:18 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
danudwary.secondarymetabolism.com
The Secondary Metabolism feed is doing some surprising numbers and shows very solid growth from where it started! 70-150 of you are hitting it daily!

Reminder that if you want your post to go into the feed immediately, don't JUST use the term 'natural product'. At least use #natprod or #secmet
October 22, 2025 at 2:06 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
evolvedbiofilm.bsky.social
Yi continues on their single-nucleus RNA-seq approach to reveal localized and cell type-specific pathways in plant during root-microbiome interaction

See their @natcomms.nature.com
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Pseudomonas WCS417 and plant genes

#BGIspatialmicrobiome
Comparative single-nucleus RNA-seq analysis revealed localized and cell type-specific pathways governing root-microbiome interactions - Nature Communications
Plant roots are exposed to a diverse range of soil-dwelling microbial “friends” and “foes.” Here, via single-nucleus RNA-seq, the authors reveal cell type-specific responses to beneficial and pathogen...
www.nature.com
October 22, 2025 at 7:29 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
somssich.bsky.social
I came across this beautiful obituary for Chris Lamb in @annualreviews.bsky.social, authored by Richard Dixon:

www.annualreviews.org/content/jour...

It's very well written, putting his science into perspective & also painting a picture of Chris as a person and mentor.

#PlantScience #PlantImmunity
His studies were now raising questions that could only be fully addressed by the application ofthe newly emergingmolecular biology approaches. These were slow to permeate into the plant sciences, and I remember the look ofconfusion on colleagues’ faces when Chris took a swig of his pint of beer and then announced that we needed to adopt cloning approaches. Chris strongly believed in those days that a couple ofpints ofbeer and sev- eral cigarettes in a local pub (either the Happy Man or the Barley Mow at Englefield Green) over lunchtime helped the creative faculties and ensured an optimal design for the experiment. This work led to a series of publications on the mechanisms of induction ofPAL and chal- cone synthase, the first enzyme in the flavonoid pathway that leads to the elicitor-induced bean phytoalexins (41), as well as increased profits for the landlords of the aforementioned pubs. Chris saw this move as an acceptance by the prestigious Salk faculty, which included Nobel laureates Francis Crick and Renato Dulbecco, ofthe maturity and intellectual rigor of the Plant Biology program, and this real- ization resulted in the institute’s administra- tion giving a green light for additional faculty hires. Chris was an outstanding talent spotter, and Joanne Chory was hired in 1988 to start a program on the genetic dissection of photo- morphogenesis, with Detlef Weigel following in 1993, initially working on the genetic dissec- tion of flowering. Chris collaborated with his new hires where appropriate (39, 99), utilized the techniques they were developing, such as T-DNAactivation tagging, in his ownwork (8), and was delighted to see their programs rapidly and independently develop to a stature equal to that of his own. Chris was also attentive to the smaller, more personal details, and was remarkably generous to those who worked in his lab as students, postdoctoral fellows, or visiting scientists; it is notable that he freely allowed many of these people to take the projects they had initiated under his supervision to their new jobs. Another of his major legacies is therefore the number ofcareers he nurtured that are now flourishing at major universities and research institutes throughout the world. There are also the memories that many people have of the sheer fun of doing science with someone who is at once a great leader, a visionary, a lover of the good things in life, and the possessor of a most wonderful sense of humor.
October 17, 2025 at 12:23 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
sjorsscheres.bsky.social
I just made an account and voted for this biology laboratory made of LEGO to "promote biological research and inspire more people into the world of biology". They need 10K votes. Reposting and/or voting below would be helpful. 🤗
beta.ideas.lego.com/product-idea...
Biological Laboratory | LEGO® Ideas
This is a two-floor realistic Biological Laboratory building. In this design, I try to tell stories about biologists, introduce biology concepts to general publ…
beta.ideas.lego.com
October 16, 2025 at 8:07 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
davidlowry.bsky.social
Excited by this breakthrough work led by Dr. Lauren Stanley (now Assistant Professor at Central Michigan University). Lauren was able to develop for the first time floral dip/spray transformation methods in the yellow monkeyflower (Mimulus guttatus). bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...
Just add water: A simple floral bud injection method for stable Agrobacterium‐mediated transformation in two ecotypes of Mimulus guttatus
Premise Stable transformation is the biggest barrier to studying gene function in plants. In most species, transformation requires tissue culture and regeneration methods that may be arduous and cau...
bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
October 13, 2025 at 12:28 PM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
somssich.bsky.social
Our article "Guns in Rosettes: The Arabidopsis chemical weapons arsenal" is finally published @plantphys.bsky.social!
You can download the #OpenAccess PDF here:

doi.org/10.1093/plph...

But real connoisseurs of #AntimicrobialCompounds will want to get the vinyl boxset: #PlantScience #PlantImmunity
A vinyl box with six colored vinyl LPs sticking out of its right side. The Title "Guns in Rosettes" is on top, with the subtitle "The Arabidopsis chemical weapons arsenal" just below. Then there is an Arabidopsis plant with machine guns sticking out. Below is the statement "6-LP LIMITED EDITION COLORED VINYL BOX SET" The back cover of the vinyl box set showing the tracklist: 1. Methionine-derived compounds Aliphatic GSLs 2. Tryptophan-derived compounds (trptonites) Indolic GSLs Camalexin Hycanite (4-OH-ICN) 3. Phenylalanine-derived compounds (phenylpropanoids) Benzenic GSLs Coumarins Hydroxycinnamates Flavonoids 4. Terpenoids (E)-β-caryophyllene α- and β-pinene Thalianin, arabidin, and DMNT And the statement "Recorded live in front of an audience in 2025"
October 9, 2025 at 7:58 AM
Reposted by Maite Colinas
hormiga.bsky.social
Y'all. I just got ChatGPT to do everything in R for this manuscript. I mean EVERYTHING. And it's all legit and reproducible. I'm shook.

How are we mentoring our trainees in statistics now? Who needs to learn coding in R line by line, and who doesn't?

scienceforeveryone.science/statistics-i...
Statistics in the era of AI
How do we mentor, teach, and do stats when AI can do so much of the work?
scienceforeveryone.science
October 9, 2025 at 2:23 AM