iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Pooja Gupta

@poojag96.bsky.social

Postdoc @STRUBI (Oxford) - anti-influenza drug discovery, dabbles in cryo-ET PhD @YSBL (York) - the bioenergetics of bacterial spore germination I do microbiology, biochemistry, structural biology, biophysics whilst listening to a lot of radio/cricket

Posts Replies Media

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

bioRxiv Microbiology @biorxiv-microbiol.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Protein architectures of the bacterial spore envelope - common principles of assembly www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/20…

041

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

Matt Johnson @profmattjohnson.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Great to share our new preprint on Chlamy’s chloroplast ATP synthase at 2.2 Å we see 13 c subunits, a modified redox regulation and a complete Grotthuss proton wire 🦠☀️ www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

biorxiv.org

A 13-subunit c-ring in the Chlamydomonas chloroplast ATP synthase lowers the H⁺/ATP cost of carbon fixation

The chloroplast F1Fo ATP synthase is a rotary motor that converts the light-driven proton-motive force into the chemical energy of ATP. The number of c-subunits in its rotor fixes the number of proton...

0102

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

bioRxiv Biophysics @biorxiv-biophys.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Structural basis for nutrient-activated channel opening in bacterial spore germination receptors www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/20…

01110

Pooja Gupta @poojag96.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

Beautiful images!

031

Pooja Gupta @poojag96.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

What a funky looking engulfment defect!

000

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

Martin O'Neill @martinoneill.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

The current management of the University of Exeter are currently engaged in crude vandalism against a proud institution. Sign here to register your opposition to the self-destructive round of redundancies going on at @exeter.ac.uk . c.org/2tVvMSzDQr

c.org

Sign the Petition

Stop Redundancies at the University of Exeter

023

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

Astronomer Royal for Scotland | Catherine Heymans @astroroyalscot.bsky.social · 14/05/2026

Yesterday, 56 of our fab colleagues at the Physics & Astronomy dept in Nottingham, received “at risk of redundancy” letters. The Uni is planning to reduce the size of the Physics dept by almost a third.🧪⚛️🔭 Sign this petition to show them your support ✍️: nottinghamphysics.github.io/Open_Letter/

Petition statement

We, the undersigned, call on the University of Nottingham to reverse its plans to impose compulsory redundancies on its staff in the School of Physics and Astronomy.

The University threatens to cut twenty members of staff out of the seventy one currently in the School. On 12 May, fifty six of those members of staff received letters notifying them that they were at risk of redundancy. This affects academic and technical staff at all levels, from Research Fellows to Professors.

1115183

Pooja Gupta @poojag96.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

Great narrative, wonderful discovery - dormancy as a phenomenon never ceases to amaze!

010

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

Jay T Lennon @jaytlennon.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

"When energy is scarce, evolution selects dormancy" Commentary by Chris Kempes in @pnas.org www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

pnas.org

When energy is scarce, evolution selects dormancy | PNAS

When energy is scarce, evolution selects dormancy

0225

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

Adrià Sogues @adriasogues.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

This one deserves it🤩! We used cryo‑EM to identify a new “sporesilk” in Bacillus thuringiensis. The fiber, called A‑ENA, forms an incredibly stable covalent network that increases virulence by keeping the toxic payload and spores in a biofilm-like structure. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

nature.com

Auto-crosslinking sporesilk fibers promote endospore and Cry toxin clustering - Nature Communications

Authors reveal that protein nanofibrils govern assembly of bacterial spores and extrasporal toxins into insecticidal aggregates. Spores and parasporal bodies are incased in a “sporesilk” matrix that d...

12510

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

Michael Grange @michaelgrange.bsky.social · 17/06/2025

Proud to share our latest paper. doi.org/10.1016/j.cr... Through the dedication of @glynnca.bsky.social and @cryingem.bsky.social we report a thorough method to image molecular organisation within hippocampus tissue. Structural biology in tissue is well and truly here! @rosfrankinst.bsky.social

26223

Reposted by Pooja Gupta

Chris H. Hill @chillzaa.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

New cryo-EM/ET story - a brilliant collaboration with Sergey Melnikov's lab in Newcastle @sergeymelnikov.bsky.social and Stefan Pfeffer's lab in Heidelberg @pfeffercryolab.bsky.social. Great work in particular by Karla Helena-Bueno and @sophiekopetschke.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

nature.com

Structurally heterogeneous ribosomes cooperate in protein synthesis in bacterial cells - Nature Communications

Cells can simultaneously produce structurally dissimilar ribosomes, suggesting functional specialization of distinct ribosome populations. Here, the authors show that distinct ribosomes cooperate rath...

510334

Pooja Gupta @poojag96.bsky.social · 18/03/2025

The preprint is out now - we describe how Bacillus spores restart energy metabolism as they exit dormancy! Dormant spores are dehydrated, very robust for long periods, but when they sense nutrient availability, they can germinate rapidly to make the most of the favourable environmental conditions 1/

1124