Martin Jonikas

@JonikasLab

@mjonikas.bsky.social
I'm a scientist studying enhanced photosynthetic CO2 assimilation!
Opinions are my own and do not reflect those of my employer.

Princeton, NJ jonikaslab.princeton.edu Joined May 2015

215 Following 1.6K Followers 349 Posts

Latest posts 5

Martin Jonikas @JonikasLab Aug 3

A starch sheath surrounds many pyrenoids to enhance CO2 fixation, but how the sheath is shaped was unknown. We discovered that the starch-branching enzyme SBE1 promotes lateral growth of starch to shape the sheath! biorxiv.org/content/10.648…

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Martin Jonikas @JonikasLab Jul 22

Engineering a pyrenoid into crops could boost yields, but testing components in plants takes months. To accelerate engineering, we made Nicotiana benthamiana with hybrid algal Rubisco, enabling the reconstitution of pyrenoid number regulation in a plant! biorxiv.org/content/10.648…

Martin Jonikas @JonikasLab Jul 5

The algal pyrenoid turbocharges global CO2 fixation. Central to its function are specialized membranes that deliver CO2. We discovered that the protein RBMP2 makes these membranes—and found that the mysterious minitubules appear to enhance CO₂ delivery!
biorxiv.org/content/10.648…

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Martin Jonikas @JonikasLab Jul 5

Happy 250th, USA!

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Martin Jonikas @JonikasLab Jun 15

Pyrenoid tubules are essential for supercharging CO₂ fixation, but they're hard to resolve by microscopy. So, we physically expanded cells to see where different proteins go (3 examples below). The central region appears specialized for CO₂ delivery!
biorxiv.org/content/10.648…