Lymphocyte Activation Lab
News

New paper out!

New paper out!
“The SNARE protein Vti1b is recruited to the sites of BCR activation but is redundant for antigen internalisation, processing and presentation”, out in Frontiers in Cell and Developmental Biology (the article can be found through here), was a great collaboration effort between the group members and provides an awesome kick-off to the PhD projects of Blanca and Amna, who only started in the lab 1 year ago!
The study describes a SNARE protein Vti1b in the internal membranes, particularly the Golgi, of B cells with response and enrichment to the sites of BCR activation.
Massive congratulations to all involved!
Front. Cell Dev. Biol., 30 August 2022, Sec. Membrane Traffic | doi: https://doi.org/10.3389/fcell.2022.987148
                                                                                                                                      

New Antibuddies incoming!

Since last March, we have welcomed a new lab intern and a MSc student that will perform her thesis with us.

Anni Virtanen, currently undergoing her BSc in Biochemistry in UTU, has been a multitasking force around the lab helping in several projects and always eager to learn more and more.

Maria Tarczewska, currently performing her MSc studies in BIMA program, has been more focused on the extracellular vesicles projects and is very keen on expansion microscopy.

Welcome aboard and all the best!

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Upgrading to MSc student

Our Erasmus intern Özge Balci got accepted in the MSc programme of Biomedical Imaging (joint programme between University of Turku and Åbo Akademi University) with full scholarship! Moreover, she was also granted a Finnish Scolarship for the next 2 years as the top merit applicant of the programme.

Well done and keep up the good work!

New paper published!

We are pleased to announce that our latest paper, titled “AutoCoEv-A High-Throughput In Silico Pipeline for Predicting Inter-Protein Coevolution” has been accepted for publication in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences! The article can be found through here. Accompanying scripts can be found at GitHub.

“AutoCoEv – A High-Throughput In Silico Pipeline for Predicting Inter-Protein Coevolution” offers a a user-friendly, open source, computational pipeline, that enables the search of coevolution within a large number of proteins from a predetemrined dataset. By driving 15 individual programs, culminating in CAPS2 as the software for detecting coevolution, AutoCoEv achieves a seamless automation and parallelization of the workflow. Importantly, a patch to the CAPS2 source code is provided to strengthen its statistical output, allowing for multiple comparison corrections and an enhanced analysis of the results.

Thanks to all involved!

Int.J.Mol.Sci. 2022 Mar 20;23(6):3351. doi: 10.3390/ijms23063351.
The pipeline of AutoCoEv.

Alexey Sarapulov defended his PhD thesis in March 2022 – the first PhD graduate from Mattila’s lab!

Congratulation to our very own first PhD graduate from Mattila lab, Alexey Sarapulov who successfully defended his PhD thesis entitled “B cell-mediated immunity and signal regulation” on March 11th. We extend our warm gratitude to Professor Lars Nitschke, his opponent from Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, for accepting the invitation and for such an amazing scientific discussion.

The thesis can be found here.

Mattila’s lab members wish all the best on Alexey’s new endeavours!

New paper out!

We are thrilled to announce that our article titled “A specific hybridisation internalisation probe (SHIP) enables precise live-cell and super-resolution imaging of internalized cargo”, has been published in Scientific Reports. The article can be found here.

The specific hybridization internalisation probe (SHIP) assay, developed for flow cytometry studies, employs a ssDNA fluorescence internalisation probe and a complementary ssDNA quenching probe to unambiguously detect the internalized receptors/cargo. We take advantage of the SHIP assay to study the trafficking of receptor/ligand complexes using B lymphocytes and B cell receptor-mediated antigen internalization as a model system.

Our article has been included in the “Editor’s choice: super-resolution microscopy” which highlights the versatility and significance of this model system.

Congratulations to all involved!

Scientific Reports, 12 Jan 2022, 12(1):620, doi: 10.1038/s41598-021-04544-6

Schematic of the SHIP assay.

Special seminar

Excited to host a special seminar by Dr María Isabel Yuseff on Thursday (03 Feb) on “Coupling Cytoskeleton Dynamics to Polarized lysosome Trafficking: Impact on B cell Responses”

Personal funding!

Congratulations Saara and Amna for the awesome work at securing personal funding!

Thank you, Finnish Cultural Foundation and the University of Turku Graduate School!

Exciting research visit!

Happy to host Dr María Isabel Yuseff and MSc Felipe Del Valle on a research visit!! Welcome to snowy Turku, Isabel and Felipe!