Max Wilkinson

Max Wilkinson

@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

keen on reverse transcription | also keen on spliceosomes | cryoEM dabbler Assistant Member @MSKCC Formerly post-doc @MIT Formerly-formerly PhD @MRC_LMB Formerly formerly-formerly Otago Uni Kiwi 🥝 🇳🇿 https://wilkinsonlab.bio/

668 followers128 following31 posts

Max Wilkinson reposted

Joanna W Jachowicz
@jjachowicz.bsky.social

If you want to explore ncRNA dynamics during mammalian development, love microscopy, and are not afaraid of transposons biology, apply‼️ We are looking for a postdoc to join our team at @imbavienna.bsky.social More details 👇🏻

Institute of Molecular Biotechnology@imbavienna.bsky.social

We are hiring! Join the Jachowicz lab as a postdoctoral researcher. The project focuses on understanding the dynamics of ncRNAs using high-resolution and single-molecule microscopy approaches. Link below 👇

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

this was such fun to help with. Lead author @glennli.bsky.social is a phenomenon! There were many surprises and twists in this story. It's a great example of the value of diving deeply into strange observations.

David Bartel's Lab@bartellab.bsky.social

We’re excited to share our latest preprint on the mechanism of excised linear intron stabilization in yeast! This work was led by PhD student @glennli.bsky.social and was a wonderful collaboration with @maxewilkinson.bsky.social. Link: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... (1/4)

Max Wilkinson reposted

Simone Alma Evans
@simone-alma.bsky.social

I am so excited to share our project with you! We find prokaryotic proteases activate toxic enzymes and pores as a modular strategy in phage defense. We studied four fascinating protease-toxin pairs that are abundant across bacterial genomes: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

biorxiv.orgProteolytic activation of diverse antiviral defense modules in prokaryotesLinked protease–effector modules are widespread in prokaryotic antiviral defense, yet the mechanisms of most remain poorly understood. Here we show that four of the most prevalent modules—metallo-β-la...
Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

a highly attractive hypothesis for the origin of telomerase, but imo more evidence is needed to rule out convergent evolution 1- other RT phylogenies place TERT within eukaryotic retroelement clades 2- template jumping could plausibly evolve into repeat synthesis activity multiple independent times

Sternberg Lab@sternberglab.bsky.social

1/10 Genome maintenance by telomerase is a fundamental process in nearly all eukaryotes. But where does it come from? Today, we report the discovery of telomerase homologs in a family of antiviral RTs, revealing an unexpected evolutionary origin in bacteria. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

biorxiv.orgAntiviral reverse transcriptases reveal the evolutionary origin of telomeraseDefense-associated reverse transcriptases (DRTs) employ diverse and distinctive mechanisms of cDNA synthesis to protect bacteria against viral infection. However, much of DRT family diversity remains ...
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Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

Full story here! We hope this expands the toolkit of retrotransposon-based gene editors. Also, check out related work from Kathy Collins lab, who also illuminated how R2 can be used for mammalian genome engineering, and @akankshathawani.bsky.social who also recently solved an R2Tg structure! (fin)

doi.orgStructure and biochemistry-guided engineering of an all-RNA system for DNA insertion with R2 retrotransposons - Nature CommunicationsR2 retrotransposons are natural RNA guided gene insertion systems. Here, Edmonds et al. characterize the structure and biochemistry of an avian R2 and engineer a compact, all-RNA system to integrate D...
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Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

The fabulous Grace then took over. She replaced parts of R2Tg RNA with custom sequences — “tricking” the retrotransposon into integrating cargo instead of itself. She then defined the minimal R2 elements required for integration, leading to a compact, efficient “mini donor”. (4/n)

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

RNA stability may limit efficiency. With help from Xiao Wang and her lab, we added chemical modifications to protect donor RNA from exonucleases. Combined with LNP delivery, this boosted integration efficiency to >80% in multiple human cell lines, all with an RNA system. Which is kinda nuts. (5/n)

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

R2 retrotransposons are neat! They're pretty widespread across the animal kingdom, and they propagate by copying themselves into ribosomal DNA, a highly repetitive region of the genome. This natural system inspired our design: we thought the rDNA could be a good 'safe harbour' for transgenes. (2/n)

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

We found that the R2 retrotransposon from zebra finch (Taeniopygia guttata, “R2Tg”) looked really promising! I had fun playing around with its biochemistry, and solved the cryo-EM structure of it copying its own RNA. We found key features that differ from the more well-studied insect R2. (3/n)

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

Ridiculously good work by George on LINE-1 retrotransposition! Also the paper is an inspiring read - there's some really super biochem in it

George Ghanim@automnenine.bsky.social

Did you know that two jumping sequences (LINE-1 and Alu) make up nearly 30% of our genomes? Ever wonder how they jump into new genomic sites? We have some exciting discoveries to share new in @science.org on the structural mechanisms of LINE-1 retrotransposition (aka jumping 🧬➡️🧬) 🧪 #ScienceResearch

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

we recently found some really neat RNA-guided DNA-cutting systems in phages. Despite remarkable similarities to CRISPR systems, including encoding guide RNAs in arrays, they appear entirely evolutionarily distinct (but definitely related to snoRNAs 🤓) We decided to call them TIGR-Tas systems 🐯

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

TIGR might have some advantages over CRISPR in genome editing (absolutely tiny, no PAM), but more importantly it's just some really neat, mysterious biology. Maybe TIGR is used by phages to fight other viruses? We don't know yet! Many many many questions left.

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

absolute pleasure working on this with @guilhemfaure.bsky.social, Makoto Saito, other great colleagues, and our fearless leader Feng Zhang. Lots more details here: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... (I'll try to make a fancier movie in time for the press version 🤞🤞) (hashtag #TIGR #Tas)

science.orgTIGR-Tas: A family of modular RNA-guided DNA-targeting systems in prokaryotes and their virusesRNA-guided systems provide remarkable versatility, enabling diverse biological functions. Through iterative structural and sequence homology-based mining starting with a guide RNA-interaction domain o...
Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

please go check out this glowing pink blob and what it does to the shiny gold blob (it's a spliceosome! Truly it was a nostalgic pleasure to help out with this paper, a super fun collaboration with @uwmadisonrna.bsky.social & Kathy and Karli)

eLife@elife.bsky.social

A splicing factor called Fyv6 controls the selection of 3ʹ splice sites in yeast. https://buff.ly/49aQvWQ

Max Wilkinson
@maxewilkinson.bsky.social

gonna start shamelessly crossposting some of my molecular movies from the Other Place. Starting with my favourite: showing how wacky reverse transcription can defeat viruses. Bonus: some noises 🎹🎻

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