Nick Desnoyer
@NickDesnoyer
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Postdoc fellow & @osventuresllc grantee @TheSainsburyLab 🌱🧬 Designing flowers for art and education 🌹✨ Info: https://t.co/L5C39riKg1
Norwich, UK
Joined December 2018
In one year, I genetically engineered the boring Arabidopsis into a beautiful ornamental flower 🧬🌹 Here is how and why I gave this model organism a visual upgrade 🧵(1/7)
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One day you’re watching a documentary about @GoogleDeepMind and the next you’re meeting part of the team 🙌 So grateful to be in the @KamounLab working alongside scientists doing truly cutting-edge research.
Fantastic hosting the @GoogleDeepMind team at TSL with @KamounLab 🌱 From AI in plant health to building scientific capacity, our missions clearly resonate! Tools like AlphaFold can accelerate scientific breakthroughs in our field -holding real promise for global food security 🌍
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Heat-shock inducible CRE-LOX of RUBY making cool sectors in my primary transformants (though a bit leaky) 🌱🧬
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For more on petunia transposon patterns check out this paper or go follow @ATinyGreenCell who designs petunia in his home lab! https://t.co/rLwr6nr1Gz
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Friday Flower 007: Petunia 💮✨ Petunias carry the active transposon dTph1, which powers mutant screens and paints stripey patterns as it jumps. Their five petals are fused, with diverse color designs tracing the corolla’s fusion seam.
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Fantastical flowers, synthetic biology, and storytelling. Giving an accessible science talk tomorrow at 10:40 UK time... come join! Register here for the link 👉 https://t.co/8CgKAfvEhR
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This is amazing. You guys rock 🤘
Thanks @NickDesnoyer for your amazing 1000 Flower Collection project 🌸. It’s truly inspiring to see how science and art can come together in such a fantastic scientific communication initiative. Together with @Laskotillean, you’ve got a couple of fans here in Madrid. 🌱👕🌷
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Friday Flower 006: Aquilegia 🌸🦋 Columbines vary in stamen number, making them a powerful model for how floral whorls expand. Darwin marveled at their long nectar spurs, which co-evolve with hawkmoth tongues to reward pollinators that brush the stamens 🧬✨
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For under $100 (excluding camera) you can make a dedicated timelapse chamber for imaging plants at the microscale like this liverwort gemmae (about 0.2 mm!). Step 1 is finding an old microscope collecting dust somewhere 🧐
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If you're new to electronics like me, I recommend the ELEGOO UNO R3 Project Super Starter Kit on amazon, learn the basic code, and start programming with chat GPT.
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Converted this dusty Zeiss stereoscope into a timelapsing machine with automated Z-stacking and synchronized lights for circadian rhythm 🦾🌱 Give old microscopes a second chance. Wiring diagram for arduino noobs below 🧵
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I find that so many biologists are also very talented artists. @HsuanPai1 is a skilled technician and apparently good at any artistic media she touches.. even LB.
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A nice visual reference for how GFP and fluorescence works.
GFP quick guide! 🧵 Green fluorescent protein, isolated from Aequorea victoria 🪼, has 11 antiparallel beta strands forming a cylinder that contains the chromophore (green). Fluorescence of the chromophore is protected from quenching with water by the stable barrel structure.
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iGEM Paris is going to be on fire this year 🤘 Will be sharing exciting developments in flower genetic design! 🌹✨
Engineering flowers as a means for public outreach and art! Dr. @NickDesnoyer reimagines Arabidopsis with new colors and shapes, blending plant biology, synthetic biology and creative arts! Hear him speak at SB 8.0 at the iGEM Grand Jamboree! https://t.co/0U9KvfYODY
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Synthetic biology and art go hand in hand 🧬 🌹 Thanks @KhanMak12 for the invitation to hang out with peeps @london_synbio. It was a great trip :)
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The first “microscopy art” I ever posted back in 2021. To everyone who’s followed along the way, thank you so much 🙏 The journey is only just getting started :)
No biological question, just intriguing photos of liverwort, hornwort, and moss chloroplasts. Thanks to @BioBiest for providing the Anthoceros and completing the bryophyte holy trinity.
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The result: A 6mm flower scaled up 150X to 1 meter and printed on metal. A "little flower" made larger than life. The cracks from freezing? Unintentional, but they capture the essence of a sculpture perfectly :)
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Using, cryo-SEM, I froze my little flowers at –180 °C under high vacuum, coated them in platinum and captured them in exquisite detail. Each "bubble" here is a single cell 🤯
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Flowers are "sculpted" by the floral meristem, a small niche of cells that decide where and what organs to place (centre). I'm used to this cellular scale, but how do I depict the flower as a sculpture of cells, like David? 🧐
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Beyond the human body, flowers are also natural masterpieces forged by evolution. Endlessly diverse and morphologically free 🌸🌻🌷
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