news
Welcome Enrico!
Our new PhD student Enrico Santini has started this month. We wish you a pleasant start in your PhD adventure. Your diverse interests and international background are sure to enrich our community, and we look forward to seeing how your unique perspective will contribute to our academic environment.
Sledging Day in Jaun
This January, our lab group took a well-deserved break from research for a sledging adventure in Jaun, set in the stunning Swiss Alps. We spent the day gliding down snow-covered hills, laughing and enjoying the winter landscape. After sledging, we headed to a cozy local restaurant, where we relaxed in the sun with drinks in hand. The day was a perfect mix of outdoor fun and team bonding, offering a refreshing break from our usual lab routine.
Happy Holidays!
As the year comes to a close, we are wrapping things up with a Lab Cleaning Day and our first-ever Ochsenreiter Secret Santa! 🎅🎄
Wishing everyone a joyous holiday season—stay healthy, happy, and ready for new adventures in the coming year!
Dr. Gaëlle Lentini strikes again!
Explore groundbreaking research on Toxoplasma gondii invasion, brought to you by the Lentini and Favre groups! The latest study uncovers the critical role of RDF3 in rhoptry discharge, shedding new light on parasite-host interactions. Don't miss this collaborative breakthrough—read the full paper now!
Summer school on cryo-FIB milling and in situ cryo-electron tomography (17.-20.06.2024)
Robin was honored to be selected for the prestigious Summer School on Cryo-FIB Milling and In Situ Cryo-Electron Tomography held in Heidelberg from June 17th to 20th, 2024. This exceptional opportunity allowed Robin to spend valuable time with the renowned group of Simone Mattei, focusing on groundbreaking research on Trypanosome mitochondria. The experience provided a deep dive into advanced cryo-electron microscopy techniques and fostered collaborative learning and innovation.
Amazing work featuring Dr. Gaëlle Lentini
Jean-Baptiste Marq et al. investigate cytokinetic abscission, the final stage of cell division. In Toxoplasma gondii, daughter cells form within the mother cell through endodyogeny, but the process of acquiring their plasma membrane is unclear. They demonstrate that five proteins are essential for plasma membrane accumulation during division, and their downregulation prevents abscission, though progeny can still egress but fail to glide and invade, except as conjoined twin parasites.
Congrats to Lim and coworkers…expansion microscopy highlights Giardia cell structures….
Yet another parasite that can be used in expansion microscopy…..
Congratulations to Bianca and Kodzo for their work on expansion microscopy in plasmodium
If you are into mitochondria or not - these are beautiful pictures of the parasites organelle
Bern, 10.11.2023
New manuscript in PLOS Pathogens
Congratulations to Simona, Irina and Anneliese, this was a very long journey…thanks for sticking to it…
Blogpost from Sarah Wettestadt on our recent FEMS review
Again congratulations to Simona and Irina…..
All you ever wanted to know about kDNA replication and its factors…
including a new model on how we think the minicircles are replicated….
Irina got a TAC towel
This is the point in time when you as a supervisor know your student is fully committed to the geeky world of science….(-;
Expansion microscopy mini-review
Congratulations Ana to your mini-review in the Highlights of Analytical Sciences in Switzerland
New publication from the Ochsenreiter and Schneider labs
Combination of expansion microscopy with biochemical approaches to characterise THE element of the exclusion zone filaments….
Irina and Torsten at the EMBO meeting
Very exciting mitochondrial research in Montenegro……
Sandro Käser
we are very excited to welcome Sandro as our new lab manager….
Alex and Andri, welcome to the lab
We welcome our new summer students…..
Congratulations to our collaborators for a very exciting finding
Dewar and colleagues discover new quality control pathway that degrades non imported mitochondrial proteins via the proteasome….
Still looking for a cool in person meeting in 2022 ?
How about the EMBO FEBS meeting on mitochondria life, death and disease…
THERE ARE STILL SOME OPEN SPOTS ALSO FOR STUDENTS
Thanks to the SNF for funding
The Ochsenreiter lab received the 5th consecutive SNF project grant - we are very grateful to the reviewers and the Swiss tax payers
BEST-SLAM
Congratulations Irina - very well done
Congratulations Simona - we are super proud that you received the Zwillenberg Prize 2021
Welcome Dema our new master student
Deema screens for novel kDNA maintenance factors
New publication about expansion microscopy
Congratulations Ana….
Ana to speak at the young investigator symposium Mitochondrial life, death and disease….
stay tuned to more expansion microscopy on the mitochondrial DNA segregation machinery….
Microscience Microscopy Congress 2021 (mmc2021)
Irina, Ana and Torsten speak at this microscopy conference about expansion microscopy and cryo-electron tomography…
New manuscript from Ana on the use of U-ExM in trypanosomes…there is more to come…
so cool irina and ana will be presenting their work at the german parasitology meeting next week….
irina: Fifty Shades of Grey: Cryo Electron Tomography of the TAC Region in Trypanosoma brucei
ana: Expansion Microscopy of TAC Protein-complex Arrangement in T. brucei
Congratulations to all the co-authors…first time U-ExM was shown in trypanosomes - very good job Ana…. Also congratulations, Simona for your second first author interview in JCS….
Overall a fantastic collaboration with the Butter and Guichard labs…there is more to come….
although only online we had a fantastic ls2 meeting in 21…thanks to the invited speakers as well as the selected presenters….i really enjoyed chairing and organising this session on mitochondria in health, disease and ageing
unfortunately the junior speakers did not stick around for a photo….
Welcome our two new PhD students
Bianca Berger and Clirim Jetishi will join our team and work on organelle biology…there will be more details soon…first they need to settle in…
Congratulations Simona to her PhD defense…a long and very productive journey
Yet another PhD student leaving the lab, after quite some time in my lab Simona will leave at the end of the year not without leaving huge footprints…thanks for your time, spirit and commitment….you will be dearly missed…good luck for the future…
Jeaninne is our new technician
A very warm welcome to her…
Ado has joined the lab as our new technician apprentice…
Welcome to the lab
welcome our new master student mara kern
mara is interested in studying structures of mitochondrial proteins
Lab outing in the Jura….
A lovely day not in the lab…(-:
At last….our latest story on characterizing the mitochondrial genome segregation machinery…thanks to Helene and Laura….
Now also with a prelights by Jenniver Ann Black…thanks so cool…
for details click here
Simona, Ana and colleagues have done a great job analysing the newest member of the mitochondrial genome segregation machinery in trypanosomes (TAP110). Using a range of techniques including , mass spectrometry regular epifluorescence microscopy, STED super-resolution microscopy as well es ultrastructure expansion microscopy we characterize the positioning in the TAC region and its potential function….big shout to all who participated in this study…
march 2020 new review….
the latest news on rna editing in trypanosomes…thanks to inna and all my colleagues for this comprehensive review…some of the highlights….this review discusses recent developments and introduces a consensus nomenclature for mitochondrial RNA-processing complexes and factors in trypanosoma trucei - mitochondrial rna processing events in kinetoplastid protists include 5′ modification, 3′–5′ degradation, internal sequence changes by u-insertion/deletion mrna editing, and nontemplated 3′ extensions - the specificity of mRNA editing is dictated by grnas while 5′ modifications and 3′ extensions are controlled by diverse pentatricopeptide repeat (ppr) rna-binding factors - antisense transcription plays a central role in delimiting 3′ termini of mature rnas - macromolecular protein and ribonucleoprotein complexes and auxiliary factors involved in these processes have been identified and characterized to varying degrees…
irina and ana presenting their posters at the swiss trypanosomatid meeting in leysin 2020
simona presenting her work on a novel kdna maintenance factor at the swiss trypanosomatid meeting in leysin 2020
february 2020 ls2 meeting in zurich
two days of exciting cell biology in zurich - simona, irina and ana present their research projects - and although it is not a parasitology meeting we do get some attention - especially ana with her expansion microscopy flash talk
january 2020 swiss trypanosomatid meeting in leysin
three days in the swiss alps with all the labs from switzerland working on these wonderful parasites together with several distinguished researchers in the trypanosomatid field - we had to chance to hear from vsg and surface receptor structure biology in trypanosomes (nina papavasiliou - mark carrington) to lipid biology in t.cruzi (barbara burleigh) and t. brucei (terry smith) - leishmania and its viral partner (nicolas fasel) - many excellent student talks (among them the one from simona on the tac) - on thursday night irina and ana presented their posters in the famous poster night…which was followed by the even more famous night in the stinky bar…altogether a meeting to be remembered
october 2019 new publication in nucleic acids research:
our collaborator achim schnaufer published the first complete set of minicircles and the corresponding expression profile of guide rnas from trypanosoma brucei - for more than five decades researchers have worked on the kinetoplast dna and its genes, now for the first time we have a very good overview on the sequence diversity - if you are interested in more on this topic of rna-editing please click here
september 2019 phd defense of hélène baudouin
after four years hélène defended her thesis: “biochemical approaches to identify and characterize proteins involved in kdna maintenance in trypanosoma brucei” - hélène gave interesting insights into how to fish out new candidates involved in kdna segregation - thanks for all your effort and time in the lab….
september 2019 lab hike to the stockhorn 2190m…
ana organized our 2019 lab hike to the stockhorn - a beautiful hike up to the top of the 2190m mountain in the berner oberland - aside from the beautiful views onto the swiss alps we also enjoyed tasty local food and quite a bit of sun…