Mehdi Jafarnejad

RBPscan: A quantitative in vivo tool for profiling RNA-binding protein interactions Kretov et al. introduce RBPscan, an RNA-editing-based platform that measures how RNA-binding proteins engage their targets in living cells. This approach quantifies the binding strength of protein-RNA...

RBPscan: A quantitative in vivo tool for profiling RNA-binding protein interactions: Molecular Cell www.cell.com/molecular-ce...

Looking for a truly unique PhD programme on RNA drugs and therapeutics? We have just opened the call for the second cohort of RNAmed-Future leaders in RNA-based medicine. More details under www.rnamed.de Please spread the word.

🎉Proud to present our latest paper, out now in Nature Communications: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

RNA Binding Proteins (RBPs) are often full of intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs), but what these regions do during RNA recognition is often unclear. 1/10
#RNA #IDR #RBP

Termination of the integrated stress response Stress responses enable cells to detect, adapt to, and survive challenges. The benefit of these signaling pathways depends on their reversibility. The integrated stress response (ISR) is elicited by p...

Answer to a key and longstanding question;
How does the integrated stress response terminate?

| Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

eIF3 musketeers: loyal in health, rogue in disease, and redeemed by therapeutic targeting - The EMBO Journal The eukaryotic translation initiation factor 3 (eIF3) is the largest and most complex initiation factor in eukaryotes, functioning as a central hub that integrates signals from cellular stress, metabo...

There ain’t much that eIF3 doesn’t do! Very nice (and rather comprehensive) review on all things eIF3.
link.springer.com/article/10.1...

This is brilliant!

eIF5B-Driven Translational Control Impacts Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma Pathophysiology.
From the talented PhD student Pavan Narasimha in Nehal Takhor lab. Great to see this work out in preprint and looking forward to more cool stuff from Pavan's recent works!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

⭐NAR Breakthrough! ⭐
#RNAtherapeutics show strong promise for #CNSdisorders 🧠. #Preclinical studies reveal that very high doses of #oligonucleotides can cause brief, reversible neuronal activation driven by metal ion interactions 🧪.
Read the full article here: doi.org/10.1093/nar/...

Join us;
We have an opening for a BBSRC-funded 3-year postdoc position to investigate the mechanisms of mRNA-specific translational regulation of the innate immune system.

#Postdoc #RNA #RBP #MolecularBiology #Virology #RNASky #AcademicJobs

hrwebapp.qub.ac.uk/tlive_webrec...

This can't be a good sign!

RNA-binding proteins and ribonucleoproteins as determinants of immunity - Nature Reviews Immunology RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) considerably expand the information content of the genome and can determine the lifespan, localization and function of RNA, thereby controlling when, where and how much pro...

Just out @natrevimmunol.nature.com
RNA-binding proteins and ribonucleoproteins as determinants of immunity
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
gives our perspective on this growing area of research. Special thanks to the editor Alexandra, for streamlining the manuscript.

This is pretty cool!

We are looking for a postdoc to work on mechanisms of #RNA decay in cancer using #cryoEM with #nanobodies and #minibinders! Please RT

Wow; Derepression of a single microRNA target causes female infertility in mice!

Very much looking forward to hosting @alf-castello.bsky.social for this talk as part of the @irishrna.bsky.social online lecture series.
Don’t miss it if either host-virus interactions, RNA-binding proteins, or both are interesting to you!

⭐NAR Breakthrough! ⭐

🔬 #tRNA modifications fine-tune #translation; in yeast, their loss slows #ribosomes at hard-to-read codon pairs, causing collisions ⚠️, and cells deploy quality control pathways to prevent #proteotoxicstress and ensure survival.
🧬Read more: doi.org/10.1093/nar/...

Viral RNA blocks circularization to evade host codon usage control - Nature Rather than adapting to the codon usage of their host, viruses use viral 5′ untranslated regions to initiate translation, which allows them to produce viral proteins in host cells efficiently despite ...

We can learn a lot about our own biology just by figuring out how viruses hack our systems! Avoid mRNA circularization to scape the codon usage trap set by the host.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

ZAKα is a sensor of mRNA stasis at the ribosomal exit channel Despite a growing interest in the ribotoxic stress response (RSR), it remains unknown how the upstream p38 and JNK-activating MAP3 kinase ZAKα senses translational impairment. Combining Alphafold3 pre...

New preprint out!
Our latest work on how ZAKα is activated by stalled or/and collided ribosomes is now online🎉. #Ribosome #RibotoxicStressResponse #ZAKα #Translation #mRNA www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

@qmbci.bsky.social @cruk-cityoflondon.bsky.social @cancerresearchuk.org @bartscharity.bsky.social

RBP2GO: a comprehensive pan-species database on RNA-binding proteins, their interactions and functions Abstract. RNA–protein complexes have emerged as central players in numerous key cellular processes with significant relevance in health and disease. To fur

RBP2GO: a comprehensive pan-species database on RNA-binding proteins, their interactions and functions

academic.oup.com/nar/article/...

ZAK activation at the collided ribosome - Nature The kinase ZAK is activated at collided ribosomes to mediate the ribotoxic stress response.

Check out our latest work on how collided ribosomes activate the MAP3K ZAK! 💫

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

A fun collaboration with @beckmannlab.bsky.social @doubleshuang.bsky.social

Programmable initiation of mRNA translation by trans-RNA - Nature Biotechnology Translation can be initiated from a specific start codon using trans-RNA.

Programmable initiation of mRNA translation by trans-RNA - @cornelluniversity.bsky.social @iecb.bsky.social go.nature.com/3K7SEdO

We’ll soon be advertising a postdoc position (3 years) to study how mRNA-specific translational regulation shapes the innate immune system, in collaboration with @alf-castello.bsky.social. The formal ad will be out soon but get in touch if you’d like an informal chat! #RNASky

RNA binding proteins control the G2-M checkpoint of the germinal center B cell Germinal center B cells rely on ZFP36L1 and ZFP36L2 to control cell division and avoid replication stress that leads to apoptosis.

🚨 New paper alert!!

RNA-binding proteins ZFP36L1 & ZFP36L2 act as guardians of genome stability in fast-dividing germinal center B cells.
A new mechanism showing how post-transcriptional control keeps our immune cells in check!
#RNA #Bcells #GenomeStability

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Come and join us at Queen’s University Belfast via these tenure-track independent fellowships.

www.qub.ac.uk/Research/fel...

Oxidative stress sensing by the translation elongation machinery promotes production of detoxifying selenoproteins Selenocysteine, incorporated into polypeptides at recoded termination codons, plays an essential role in redox biology. Using GPX1 and GPX4, selenoenzymes that mitigate oxidative stress, as reporters,...

Colliding ribosomes are potent signals of cellular stress. But do cells use ‘programmed’ ribosome collisions to regulate gene expression? I’m excited to present a new story from my lab led by Frederick Rehfeld(@fred-rehfeld.bsky.social) which revealed that the answer is YES! Read on to find out how👇

@alf-castello.bsky.social & I are inviting applications for a competitive PhD studentship to study the mechanisms of translational regulation of the host response to RNA virus infections. The student will be based at Uni. Glasgow. Please spread the word. #RNASky

www.gla.ac.uk/postgraduate...

The DND1-NANOS3 complex shapes the primordial germ cell transcriptome via a heptanucleotide sequence in mRNA 3'UTRs The RNA-binding proteins DND1 and NANOS3 are essential for primordial germ cell survival. Their co-immunoprecipitation and overlapping loss-of-function phenotypes suggest joint function, yet how they ...

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Delighted to share the story of two germline RBPs - one with little (DND1) and one with no (NANOS3) intrinsic sequence-specificity - that together build a continuous RNA binding surface recognizing a 7-mer (AUGAAUU) in target mRNA 3’UTRs, leading to deadenylation.

Amazing paper & very cool mechanism!

Protein synthesis and translational control

Looking forward to a few days of exciting discussions at the #EMBLProtein synthesis and translational control meeting www.embl.org/about/info/c...