Crys Conn

Happy Holidays from the Conn Lab! Welcoming new Senior Research Specialist, Dr. Ali Khawar and joint (youngest) lab member with @TheModzLab Hayes Modz Conn :) Excited for lots of growth in 2026!

Fantastic new research!

KRAS inhibitors have been used to treat pancreatic cancer, but can they PREVENT cancer from occurring altogether? In @ScienceMagazine from @PennCancer Cancer interception with KRAS inhibitors in preclinical models of #PancreaticCancer science.org/doi/10.1126/sc…

Why do GLP-1 drugs fail to cause fat loss in some? A mitochondrial switch ("SLC25A45") controls whether mitochondria burn fat or carbohydrate, and removing it (in mice) makes GLP-1 drugs stop working for fat loss entirely. "Mitochondrial control of fuel switching via carnitine biosynthesis," Science, Vol 391, Issue 6786, (10.1126/science.ady5532)

Excited to share our new paper on #microproteins in @MolecularCell ! Thousands of non-canonical ORFs are translated across the genome, potentially encoding a vast “dark proteome” of uncharacterized proteins. But which ones are actually functional? authors.elsevier.com/a/1miua_OylrmL…

m6A is the most common internal mRNA modification, but we still don't know what most m6A sites actually DO. Zhang et al. built FOCAS -- a CRISPR-based platform using dCas13b-FTO to precisely remove m6A at specific sites without touching the DNA. doi.org/10.1016/j.cell…

Our work is now published in @Nature. We introduce the Mouse Cancer Cell Line Atlas (MCCA) and reveal deterministic, tissue-specific rules of KRAS-driven cancer evolution. Huge thanks to the entire team & collaborators. nature.com/articles/s4158…

1/ A revised preprint (v2) on cancer metabolism! A team effort with @Nancy_T_S, Lake-Ee Quek and others. We test a core idea: do aggressive cancers really “burn fat” (fatty acid oxidation, FAO) as a major mitochondrial fuel? Link: biorxiv.org/content/10.110…

New Online! Subcellular localization as a driver of protein function dlvr.it/TR2D3c

Happy Valentine's Weekend to all! Very fortunate to my fantastic group & them being eachothers' Valentines :)

New @CD_AACR paper by David Tuveson @CSHL Myofibroblasts induce neuroplasticity to promote pancreatic inflammation and #PancreaticCancer progression aacrjournals.org/cancerdiscover… Striking to see how early & densely neo-innervation occurs in pancreatic precursor lesions (PanINs)

📢Don't miss this recently published @NatureCancer Article! 'METTL3-based epitranscriptomic editing screening identifies functional m6A sites in cancers' ✒️By Housheng Hansen He, Xin Xu and colleagues 🔗nature.com/articles/s4301…

Signaling to make human ribosomes: Connections between the cytoplasm and the nucleolus dlvr.it/TQpQfm

If you are interested in bioinformatics (and have some training on that front) come join my and @RuggeroDavide's lab at UCSF. aprecruit.ucsf.edu/JPF05945

Announcing the 2026 edition of the EMBO workshop on RNA localization and local translation! This meeting will be held June 30 - July 4 near Porto, Portugal. Come for exciting updates in the field from both established investigators and trainees. See the link below for details!

We at @arcinstitute are announcing a fellowship program for undergraduates who are excited about the applications of AI in biology. We have designed this to be focused on team projects, but for this inaugural year, we are also including an individual track.

This Friday @4pm: How to design an impactful and polished scientific poster WORKSHOP!

@LukeGilbertSF Congratulations Luke!

I am so excited to see epigenetic editing (CRISPRoff) move forward as a new approach in medicine through this clinical trial. We hope to make a difference for folks with HBV. Congratulations on a big step forward to all who made this possible! nchromabio.com/press-release/…

Online Now: Signaling to make human ribosomes: Connections between the cytoplasm and the nucleolus dlvr.it/TQcnr2

@NutritionNerd @JasonSynaptic @TheModzLab I was trying this with you today.. and you didn't even acknowledge 😆

When you’re trying to do the new biosketch form and your husband (who already did it) refuses to help. 😆 @JasonSynaptic

@LyssiotisLab Please, I started this afternoon.. and quickly gave up for more tolerable uses of time: Crystal.Conn@pennmedicine.upenn.edu

I have been instructed on hacks to making the formatting more palatable! Too much to type here, DM and I’ll send the slide deck from Michigan Medicine IT 💪🏼