iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Aritz Roa-Eguiara

@aritz-roa.bsky.social

397 followers 590 following 39 posts

Former PhD student at the Structural Biology of Molecular Machines group (a.k.a. Taylor group). Mostly bacteriophages and membrane proteins.

Posts Replies Media

Aritz Roa-Eguiara @aritz-roa.bsky.social · 14/07/2026

Last dance representing the Taylor group in Prague at #VoM2026 to talk about phages. Impressive setup in a beautiful city and unmatched closure to the PhD journey. Now time to slow down a bit before searching for the next challenge ☀️🫶🏻 #phagesky

090 0

Aritz Roa-Eguiara @aritz-roa.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

Thank you to #VoM2026 and all the audience for the impressive setup and nice experience. It was so much fun!! Day one done, four to go!

1120 0

Aritz Roa-Eguiara @aritz-roa.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

And this journey got to an end: PhD ✅ Thank you to everyone who took part on it along the way and to the committee (Tom Miller, Mark van Raaij and Michela Gambino) for the positive feedback and great discussion. Now time to get ready for VOM2026!!

0100 0

Aritz Roa-Eguiara @aritz-roa.bsky.social · 07/03/2026

Together, these results provide a structural framework for how contractile phages regulate genome delivery and superinfection exclusion. They also allow us to visualize how genome translocation into the host occurs:

Summary figure on phage T4 infection, showing the contraction and the conduit formation.

130 0

Aritz Roa-Eguiara @aritz-roa.bsky.social · 07/03/2026

After tail contraction, the genome remains in the virion. This is mediated by TMP binding to the distal end of the tube, preventing premature DNA release! This is ejected upon membrane interaction when the TMP-tube complex rearranges to create a conduit for genome translocation into the host.

The distal end tube of phage T4 during genome release. From the pre-contracted state (panel a) to the post-contracted state where the genome ejection is arrested (panel b) and finally the open conduit for genome release (panel c)

120 0

Aritz Roa-Eguiara @aritz-roa.bsky.social · 07/03/2026

We characterised three phage T4 states: the pre-contracted virion with retracted LTFs, the post-contracted virion before genome ejection, and the post-ejected genome state of the post-contracted virion upon lipid membrane interaction.

Phage T4 states and genome release. CryoEM maps and structural models to show the virions.

130 0

Aritz Roa-Eguiara @aritz-roa.bsky.social · 07/03/2026

🚨Preprint! Happy to share the research from my PhD “Genome delivery of a contractile tailed phage and its superinfection exclusion mechanism”. We use cryoEM to study the genome ejection of the phage T4, revealing how the tape measure protein regulates the process. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

610640 0