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Michael Borg

@borglab.bsky.social
669 followers 590 following 38 posts

🇲🇹 Exploring the weird and wonderful world of #redalgae | Professor at @uni-kiel.de | www.borglab.org

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Reposted by Michael Borg
André Marques @amarques.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Out today in Nature: sex without crossovers. Rhynchospora tenuis makes pollen, fertilises and sets seed, yet 0 crossovers in 10,997 pollen nuclei. Chromosome drive and ~87% seed abortion rebuild the mother's genotype, so the offspring are clones. doi.org/10.1038/s415...
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Vangeli Geshkovski @vgeshkovski.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
Happy to finally see this out in a peer-reviewed form 🧬🌱 Congrats to everyone who contributed! www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
The dual trxG/PcG protein ULTRAPETALA1 modulates H3K27me3 and directly enhances POLYCOMB REPRESSIVE COMPLEX 2 activity for fine-tuned reproductive transitions - Nature Plants
This study reports a bivalent factor, ULTRAPETALA1, that can counteract as well as promote PRC2 activity at hundreds of developmental genes in Arabidopsis thaliana. The pro-PRC2 activity of ULTRAPETAL...
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Dolf Weijers @dolfweijers.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
It took some time, but we are thrilled to present the first major outcome of our @erc.europa.eu ERC DIRNDL AdG project: Evgeniya Pukhovaya @epukh.bsky.social and others in our team describe the discovery of a mechanism for polar protein targeting in plants (1/13) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
biorxiv.org
Systematic proteomics identifies a conserved mechanism for polar targeting of plant cortical proteins
Multicellular development is tightly coupled to the polarization of individual cells, which partitions polar proteins along the cell cortex and can control asymmetric cell division, anisotropic growth...
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Juan Carlos De la Concepcion @delaconcepcionjc.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
PLEASE SHARE! New job openings in my lab @zmbp-tuebingen.bsky.social. We have a broad interest into the mechanistic basis of how molecular complexes are rewired during cellular development in plants and during invasion by pathogens. 🌱🍄🔬 See details below 👇 #PlantSciJobs
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Andy Plackett @seedrevolutionlab.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
www.nature.com/articles/s41... It's been a long time coming, but delighted to say that the first major output from my Royal Society Fellowship is now published. 🙂 #PlantScience
nature.com
The post-fertilization archegonium gene network of seedless plants contributed to the origin of seeds - Nature Communications
The authors identify conserved gene networks across fern and angiosperm reproductive development, including between the sporophyte ovule and the fern gametophyte egg-chamber. Repurposing of this netwo...
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Arnau Sebé-Pedrós @arnausebe.bsky.social · 03/08/2026
Happy to share the final version of our study on the evolution of chromatin states across eukaryotes, out today in @natgenet.nature.com Led by @crisnava.bsky.social and @seanamontgomery.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41... Some highlights below
nature.com
Diversity and evolution of chromatin regulatory states across eukaryotes - Nature Genetics
This study introduces iChIP2, a low-input chromatin immunoprecipitation followed by sequencing method that profiles histone post-translational modifications (hPTMs) simultaneously across diverse eukar...
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Robin Burns @robinburns.bsky.social · 25/07/2026
Delighted to share our paper on neo-chromosomes! We induced centromere fission using CRISPR in Arabidopsis and increased the chromosome count from n=5 to n=6. The broken chromosomes ends quickly “healed” by adding telomeres de novo and the new karyotype is stable through mitosis and meiosis! 1/3
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Dolf Weijers @dolfweijers.bsky.social · 23/07/2026
Online at @cellcellpress.bsky.social today: everything you always wanted (???) to know about Auxin Signaling and never dared to ask. From Jiashu, Aaron and Martijn in our team, with @luciastrader.bsky.social and Tongda Xu www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
sciencedirect.com
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Reposted by Michael Borg
Jonas Blomme @jonasblomme.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
Excited to share our latest preprint on #PhycologyFriday. We map out the carbon fixation pathway for the first time in a multicellular alga, the green seaweed Ulva, and reveal a unique Rubisco-Linker interaction in the pyrenoid, a chloroplast condensate. Below I summarize some key points. #seaweeds
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 18/07/2026
Fantastic stuff Jonas, congrats !!!
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Reposted by Michael Borg
Michael Raissig @michaelraissig.bsky.social · 08/07/2026
🌾 Every grass leaf shares the same repeating short-long cell pattern in its epidermis. Our new #preprint identifies the protein that builds it. 🔬🧬 📄 preprint: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... 🧵⬇️ 1/11
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 08/07/2026
Thanks Claudia 🙏🏼
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Reposted by Michael Borg
Jakob Schnabl-Baumgartner @jakobschnabl.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
www.cell.com/molecular-ce... I'm happy to see our work published! If you are interested in transposons, transcriptional regulation and Pol III come and check it out 👀 🧫 🧬
cell.com
ChAHP silences SINE retrotransposons by inhibiting TFIIIB recruitment
SINEs are short transposable elements that make up large fractions of mammalian genomes. Known to be transcribed by RNA polymerase III, their regulation has remained largely unexplored. Schnabl-Baumga...
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks Michael, we’ve come a long way since the party time in Oslo 🩵
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks Jürgen! 🤍
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks Dolf 💚
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks Yasin, looking forward to hosting you again in the future
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Looking forward to meeting Remco 🙏🏼
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks Luisa, looking forward to seeing you back home in the North soon enough 😊
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks Jakob, I hope all is well for you!
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks Sean 🧡
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
All good, it’s up there with Maltesers being Maltese 🇲🇹
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks Duarte 🙂
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Thanks JC 🙌
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
Our group is moving from @mpi-bio-fml.bsky.social to the maritime city of Kiel! ⛵️🩵 I will lead the Department of Marine Plant Development and Physiology @uni-kiel.de 🌱🪸🌊 Look out for opportunities to join us in this exciting & growing hub for Plant, Marine & Evolutionary Biology in North Germany 🇩🇪
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Jake Harris @c-jake-harris.bsky.social · 06/07/2026
Excited to be able to advertise 1x postdoc and 2x technician positions to join my group in Cambridge working on an exciting ARIA funded project to help bring a plant artificial chromosome into existence! Reposts very welcome please 🙏 (1/2)
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Chung Hyun Cho @chc-evobio.bsky.social · 04/07/2026
Excited to share our new preprint led by Fred and me in collaboration with the archaeal community! We found that the molecular foundation of histone-based chromatin has pre-eukaryotic roots in Asgard archaea. (1/4) #ArchaeaSky www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
biorxiv.org
Emergence of histone-based chromatin complexity in Asgard archaea
The emergence of the eukaryotes coincided with the diversification of histone proteins and their post-translational modifications by enzymes that constitute the core of eukaryotic chromatin. Yet the e...
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Steffi @steffiraju.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
Delighted and grateful to receive the 🥇 best poster prize 🏆at #EpiPlant at Nantes, France. Thanks a bunch to the organizers and fellow participants for a wonderful meeting and inspiring conversations. Feeling delighted to represent Shivaprasad lab @ncbsbangalore.bsky.social
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Reposted by Michael Borg
Philip Donoghue @phil-donoghue.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
Latest from the lab: @ruolinwu.bsky.social integrates fossil and molecular evidence to estimate the timing of origin of flowering plants. Thanks to @sabifo4.bsky.social @jameswclark.bsky.social Yue Tong, Shan Wan, Davide Pisani, Harald Schneider and Daniele Silvestro for helping to make this happen
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Marion Clavel @thevirusmc.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
Our work is out now! (www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...). We discover a selective autophagy pathway that protects plants from the mess caused by RNA viruses. Intrigued? Follow the spaghetti trail for a summary of our findings🧵-->
science.org
Selective autophagy fine-tunes plant immunity to promote cell survival during viral infection
RNA viruses co-opt host endomembranes to form replication complexes, often triggering cellular stress and immune responses. Here, we show that Arabidopsis thaliana activates selective autophagy to res...
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Alex de Mendoza @alexdemendoza.bsky.social · 02/06/2026
Capolavoro 🎨 alert 🚨! What is the role of gene body methylation in invertebrates? Despite extensive speculation linking it to plasticity and environmental responses, its mechanistic effects and heritability remain unclear. Our take out in @natecoevo.nature.com: www.nature.com/articles/s41... 1/
nature.com
Gene body methylation suppresses intragenic transcription and permits epigenetic inheritance in a cnidarian - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Experiments in the cnidarian Nematostella vectensis show a role of gene body methylation in transposable element suppression and that epigenetic inheritance is constrained by chromatin context and tra...
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Reposted by Michael Borg
Development @dev-journal.bsky.social · 01/06/2026
Call for Papers Submit your latest plant and multicellular algae #DevBio research to our upcoming special issue – Plant and Algae Development #DevSIPlantAlgae Editors: @stanfordstomata.bsky.social & Susana Coelho Deadline: 2 November 2026 journals.biologists.com/dev/pages/pl...
Call for papers Special Issue
Plant amd Algae Development

Academic Editor Dominique Bergmann (Stanford University, USA) and Guest Editor Susana Coelho (Max Planck Institute for Biology, Tübingen, Germany).

Submission deadline: 2 November 2026

Development logo to the left
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Reposted by Michael Borg
Eva Stukenbrock @estukenbrock.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
Many pathogens that infect wild plants are close relatives of crop pathogens. Important model systems for studying plant diseases. Check out the special issue on wild plant pathosystems published in the Philosophical Transactions B: royalsocietypublishing.org/rstb/issue/3...
royalsocietypublishing.org
Volume 381 Issue 1951 | Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B | The Royal Society
Influential themed journal issues across the life sciences.
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Yasin Dagdas @plantophagy.bsky.social · 06/05/2026
Now online at @natplants.nature.com ‼️ Led by Jierui Zhao, a former PhD student @gmivienna.bsky.social & together w/ @moritznowack.bsky.social lab, we uncover how #autophagy shapes salt stress tolerance and lifespan. www.nature.com/articles/s41... www.nature.com/articles/s41... A short 🧵👇
nature.com
Cell-type-specific autophagy in root-hair-forming cells is essential for salt stress tolerance in Arabidopsis thaliana - Nature Plants
This study reveals that enhanced autophagy in root-hair-forming cells helps Arabidopsis store excess sodium, control oxidative stress and tolerate salt stress.
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Dolf Weijers @dolfweijers.bsky.social · 03/05/2026
We are very happy and proud to present a study led by @jorgehg.bsky.social (now PI in Madrid – keep an eye on him!) in our team @bic-wur.bsky.social. In this work, we discover how auxin-regulated ARF transcription factors learned to activate transcription. A 🧵…(1/17) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
biorxiv.org
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Reposted by Michael Borg
Robin Burns @robinburns.bsky.social · 14/04/2026
A short review from us on the easiest way to make an allopolyploid. It was a lot of fun writing with these two. We hope you will enjoy the Pac-Man inspired allopolyploidy maze!
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Reposted by Michael Borg
canaztekin.bsky.social @canaztekin.bsky.social · 10/04/2026
🚨 Why can’t mammals regenerate limbs like frog tadpoles or salamanders? In our new paper in @science.org , we show that species-specific oxygen sensing acts as a gatekeeper for initiating limb regeneration 🐭🐸 🔗 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... #EvoDevo
science.org
Species-specific oxygen sensing governs the initiation of vertebrate limb regeneration
Why mammals cannot regenerate limbs like amphibians do presents a long-standing puzzle in biology. To uncover the underlying differences, we compared amputation responses of embryonic mouse (Mus musculus) and Xenopus laevis tadpole limbs. Lowering ...
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Yasin Dagdas @plantophagy.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
New #preprint 😍‼️ led by 2 incredible postdocs @ninizhani.bsky.social & Ranj Papareddy: transforming #UFMylation from a local ribosome rescue pathway to systems level regulator of mRNA splicing www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... A short 🧵
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Erica Dinatale @ericadinatale.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
Behind the scenes! go.nature.com/4bYY8BM
go.nature.com
What brown algae taught me about the importance of jumping genes for genome evolution
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
Yes it’s really peculiar, but equally cool that H3K79me seems to have popped up to take over the reins, with DOT1 enzymes expanding across the lineage.
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Jaruwatana (Sodai) Lotharukpong @sodail.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
Our work on chromatin evolution in brown algae is finally out! This is also my first "co-first author" paper!! I’m excited to share what we found 👇
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
This work stemmed from a fruitful collaboration with Susana Coelho @mpi-bio-fml.bsky.social. Big thanks to all authors particularly Jeromine Vigneau and @sodail.bsky.social.
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
The work is summarised in a Research Briefing accompanying the article here: www.nature.com/articles/s41.... In a nutshell, brown algae lost DNAme, H3K9me and H3K27me3 early in evolution but repurposed H3K79me (an active mark in animals and yeast) as a repressive histone mark. Seaweeds FTW!!! 🪸
nature.com
Loss of canonical epigenetic silencing reveals distinct chromatin evolution in brown algae - Nature Ecology & Evolution
Brown algae independently evolved complex multicellularity with an atypical chromatin toolkit, including early loss of DNA methylation and PRC2-mediated gene silencing. By profiling histone modificati...
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
Our work on chromatin evolution in brown algae is now published in @natecoevo.nature.com! We show that developmentally complex brown algae evolved without epigenetic silencing pathways long thought universal, underscoring why non-model lineages are important to study. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Undaria pinnatifida gametophyte
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
Congrats Thorsten!!
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Romy Petroll @petrollromy.bsky.social · 26/03/2026
I am very grateful to be featured discussing my work on transcription associated proteins and TAPscan @rensingstefan.bsky.social Many thanks to @theplantjournal.bsky.social for the opportunity and recognition!
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Michael Borg @borglab.bsky.social · 20/03/2026
I'm very happy to have been selected as a JGI New Investigator! It's exciting to know we will work closely with their fantastic team and help generate new genomic data for the wider community 🪸
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PlantEvolution 🌱🌾 @plantevolution.bsky.social · 14/03/2026
1/11 🔥 New preprint alert 🔥 We wanted to know what plants in the wild really care about. So we asked them 🎤. Here is what we learned: “Biotic-response networks are an important organizer of the transcriptome in wild Arabidopsis thaliana populations” www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
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Javier Lazaro - scientific illustration @lazaroillustration.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
Turn your study species into detailed drawings. Get in touch: lazaroillustration@gmail.com
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Hajk-Georg Drost @hajkdrost.bsky.social · 19/02/2026
Does hidden protein biology live in the suboptimal alignment space? When we align two divergent proteins, we usually trust a single optimal alignment. 🧬 But what if the real structural signal lies in the space of near-optimal solutions? With EMERALD-UI you can unfold this perspective.
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