Jesse Raab

Since there are lots of new people here I'll do the reintroduction thing. My lab is focused on gene regulation and chromatin remodelers. We're interested in how these complexes are regulated, how their disruption of complexes contribute to tumor growth, and whether they modulate therapy response

Come be my colleague - UNC has a great open-rank position with Computational Medicine/Genetics/Lineberger Cancer Center. Focus is on cancer biology and treatment. See details at unc.peopleadmin.com/postings/327...

We often think about embryonic development in the terms of genes that need to be turned on. In the Epstein Lab, I was curious about the gene networks that need to be turned off. My final postdoctoral paper examines the histone methyltransferases GLP & G9a & their association with cell identity. 🧪

I made an AI video about genzplyr and I lowkey love it. It's also 100% slop. In this post I dig into what makes something slop, when it's ok to share it, and how to avoid it in work that matters. Read more at: substack.hadley.nz/p/what-is-slop

Excited to be a new associate editor for G3 - I'd love to see more epigenetics/gene regulation papers. genestogenomes.org/genetics-and...

Starting in 1 hour!

Get out and vote! No line at my Chatham county early voting site this morning.

Now online in Cancer Discovery @aacrjournals.bsky.social: H3K4me1-Mediated Epigenomic Priming of Chemoresistant Tumor States in Ovarian Cancer - by Yuna Landais, Céline Vallot, and colleagues doi.org/10.1158/2159... @institutcurie.bsky.social

"Because manuscripts reflected real progress towards our field’s goals, our assessment systems began relying on them as primary metrics...which is obviously flawed...Generative AI has broken this already-flawed proxy completely" journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

Systematic mapping of enhancers, silencers, and topological elements using prime editing deletion screens www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... Check out our preprint on next-generation tech for mapping distal regulatory effects! We’re excited to help set this up - please get in touch Thread 👇

Earlier this year the scientific community successfully fought back on dramatic changes in Federal funding proposed by the Trump Administration.Now another RFI is proposing substantial changes that would damage peer review. This letter from SDB President Helen McNeill lays out the issue clearly 1/n

For the last 34 years I have been on the faculty of the UNC-Chapel Hill Department of Biology and have never regretted that decision. This year we are hiring TWO new Assistant Professors in the broad area of Molecular, Cell, Developmental Biology 1/n bio.unc.edu

JOB ALERT: UNC Bio is hiring 2 tenure track assistant profs doing molecular, cell, and dev bio. The search is intentionally broad, so please share widely and spread the word! Find more information and apply here: unc.peopleadmin.com/postings/325... Application review begins Nov 1.

Check the latest preprint from my group!

Opus 5.5 safety guardrails for biology seem just as overzealous as Fable's were. Immunotherapy and crispr screen both triggered.

Can't decide if this is hilarious or depressing substack.com/home/post/p-...

Hepatocellular carcinoma organoids enable drug discovery and combination therapy across heterogeneous tumors

For those in the mood for some seriously well-done gallows humor, I heartily recommend this... inpreparation.substack.com/p/nih-simpli...

Major kudos to MIT, who just put out a report about AI on their campus that lucidly explains the threat posed by AI to cognition and the student experience, while at the same time prioritizes learning, students, and the value of education. 1/x aiandeducation.mit.edu/report/

Dolly Parton, among a thousand other amazing things she did in her life, gifted over 330 million books to kids through her Imagination Library program. Her passing is a tremendous loss to the world, but you can support the program today to keep it going imaginationlibrary.com

mega yikes

Junior faculty position in Basic Sciences @fredhutch.org! Please repost!

with funding rates as low as they are we should just get a lottery ball if you're 'competitive'. There can be a show where they pull lottery numbers to see if we can keep our labs open

Excellent points on AI use for grad students:

Join the lab to study mechanisms of transcription factors, transcription, and/or chromatin! jobrxiv.org/job/uconn-he...

Epigenetic evolution of colorectal cancer and its microenvironment reveals new vulnerabilities https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.08.10.743840v1

I've had to say this so many times. My hot take is I hate peaks as a concept

Why do people buy saunas. Cant you just go spend a couple hours in your attic building shelves

Trump 2.0 has blown up US scientific research in a way that will take decades to roll back. Labs that took years to build have closed, young people have left science. NYT Mag published a long report on Dismantling Cancer Research. Why does Ross Douthat lie like this?

Finally… Excited to share what I’ve been working on for the first half of my PhD! ENCODE GRAMMAR: One of the largest collections of regulatory DNA seq2func models to date (3,865 in total) trained across ENCODE, with full model interpretations and annotations tracks. Blog: tinyurl.com/3hmknhaa 1/

thezvi.substack.com/p/the-three-... interesting read on how far AI will go.

SWI/SNF Alterations Define a Chromatin-Dependent Subtype of Urothelial Carcinoma https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.08.05.743022v1

Modular grant level was set nearly 30 years ago, in 1998. A single modular R01 cannot support a research lab with mammal models, the LARC expenses alone will deplete the budget.

This awesome picture is timely. I have tons of these on our mountain mint and I was trying to figure out what kind of wasp it was

Congrats to the Beamish #UMichMed and Watts #NIEHS labs on the new paper investigating the requirement for Sox8 in transcription, histone modification, and cell identity/function in proximal tubule cells!: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

going to make the annual inevitable second round crash out hurt even worse this year

Trump science adviser['s] proposal to reduce the role of universities would up end [the] system in place since WWII. His call for the administration to de-prioritize life sciences...raised alarms among biomedical researchers" www.nytimes.com/2026/07/22/u...

Fable is not a useful model combine-lab.github.io/blog/2026/07...

I fundamentally disagree with this. We cannot reform the NIH right now. We need to fight against ALL changes until we have an administration that isn’t hellbent on destruction. Until then we have to assume that literally everything is being done in bad faith.

Got to drive a rivian r2 this morning. They're going to sell these as fast as they can make them. Really enjoyable to drive

Science peeps, particularly trainees: When reviewing grants, it really, really helps if you have a Google Scholar page, an ORCID account, or a website that makes getting information about you, easy. Some sort of web presence. I'm begging you. Make it easier for study sections to give you money.

Can one map the genome-wide binding (1) and its protein partners (2) simultaneously from the same sample? Yes, one can. with CUT&ID ✂️🪪 Spearheaded — singlehandedly — by @annanordin.bsky.social No need of transgenesis, cloning and overexpression. Check it out, it's fast and its works.

Any biology topic it seems when I tested it. I got bounced a few times trying basic chromatin biology literature search type questions and suggested edits to reduce redundancy of cancer biology grant.

For context, this is one hundred ninety-two thousand, five-year biomedical research grants. More than five years of complete funding for the entirety of the NIH for cancer, heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, blindness, epilepsy, infectious diseases, etc… An entire generation of scientists.

The Thermo Fisher situation keeps getting worse. We've now collected 450+ problematic images presented as verification data in TF's antibody catalog. This includes: 🖌️ Dozens more images with duplications or painting 🖨️ Hundreds of blots that all share the same background (behold slideshow below)

The advantage of using @standupforscience.net, as opposed to going straight to the site (which may be flagged as closed for some) is that we keep a record of every transaction including time submitted/accepted and the full content. 2/3