Cecilia Rocchi
banner
ceciliarocchi.bsky.social
Cecilia Rocchi
@ceciliarocchi.bsky.social
Postdoc at @ox.ac.uk, Division of Structural Biology (STRUBI), Jon Grimes lab
| RNA-binding proteins, RNA viruses, crystals and cryo-EM lover |🧬🧪💎🔬🦠❄️🏔️🎿🧗🏻‍♀️🍻
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Our new preprint is out 🥳🥳🥳

Henipaviruses, like Nipah and Hendra, package their genomes inside helical shells built by thousands of nucleoproteins. These nucleocapsids are essential to protect the viral RNA, but how do they ever let the polymerase in to read the sequence?

👇
November 3, 2025 at 12:26 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Celebrate #NationalCatDay with the cats of RCSB PDB!
October 29, 2025 at 4:55 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Really excited to have our work out in the world. CCHFV has a 450kDa L-Protein, about twice the size of L-Proteins from other segmented RNA viruses. We have used cryoEM and functional assays to begin to understand it this massive multifunctional protein works.
Structural and functional characterisation of the Crimean-Congo Haemorrhagic Fever Virus RNA Dependent RNA Polymerase
Crimean-Congo Haemorrhagic Fever Virus (CCHFV) is found across Africa, Asia, and the Middle East where it can cause Haemorrhagic outbreaks with high case fatality rates. Central to the viral life cycl...
www.biorxiv.org
October 22, 2025 at 12:22 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
REGISTRATION NOW OPEN
Influenza Update 2025
University of Warwick, 15th - 16th December
warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/med/...
Registration from £50 - £120
DEADLINE: 7th November
We hope you can join us there!
October 11, 2025 at 2:47 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
We are looking for motivated #postdocs to join the lab! Biochemistry/microbiology/cryo-EM experience? Excited by #cryo-EM/ET, #chromatin? ❄️🧬🧫
Interdisciplinary projects, top EMBL facilities!
Email CV + short cover letter → [email protected]
Info about the group: www.embl.org/groups/dodon...
Dodonova Group – Organisational principles and 3D architecture of archaeal chromatin
www.embl.org
October 15, 2025 at 10:38 AM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Oropouche virus NSs protein suppresses host transcription by targeting the RNA polymerase II RPB1 protein journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/...
Oropouche virus NSs protein suppresses host transcription by targeting the RNA polymerase II RPB1 protein | Journal of Virology
Oropouche fever is a viral disease characterized by fever, headaches, and body aches, affecting thousands of people in tropical regions. The Oropouche virus (OROV) has caused and continues to cause medium to large-scale outbreaks, highlighting the urgent need to better understand its basic biology. This study focused on the viral NSs protein, which modulates host antiviral responses. Our findings demonstrate that NSs disrupt RNA polymerase II, a key enzyme in host gene expression, by reducing its activity and stability. Additionally, OROV infection alters the nucleolus, a critical center for cellular stress responses and ribosome biogenesis. These disruptions suggest that OROV suppresses host transcription and nucleolar function, thereby impairing the cellular antiviral response. Understanding these mechanisms provides new insights into host-virus interactions and viral strategies for modulating host cell responses.
journals.asm.org
September 10, 2025 at 2:31 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
🧬 Transcription elongation by RNA polymerase II relies on a web of elongation factors. Our new work shows how IWS1 acts as a modular scaffold to stabilize & stimulate elongation. Fantastic work by Della Syau! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
August 29, 2025 at 10:14 AM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
My PhD paper is in press @cellpress.bsky.social and now online: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...!

Contents: weird #NPCs in yeast and flies, #CLEM, in situ #cryoET and more!

Made possible by the amazing @becklab.bsky.social team at @mpibp.bsky.social and collaborators! #TeamTomo
The small GTPase Ran defines nuclear pore complex asymmetry
Nuclear pore complexes (NPCs) bridge across the nuclear envelope and mediate nucleocytoplasmic exchange. They consist of hundreds of nucleoporin build…
www.sciencedirect.com
August 18, 2025 at 4:26 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi

Our work, co-led by @alfredo0712.bsky.social and @nlue8.bsky.social is out in @natsmb.nature.com Shout out to coauthors P.Grob, B. Kaeser, J.Fang, and S. Kassube for their contributions and thanks to the reviewers for the suggestions that led to the final work.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Structural insights into transcriptional regulation by the helicase RECQL5 - Nature Structural & Molecular Biology
Florez Ariza and Lue et al. use cryo-electron microscopy to investigate how the RECQL5 helicase regulates transcription. Their structural findings suggest that RECQL5 can modulate RNA polymerase II’s ...
www.nature.com
July 7, 2025 at 10:35 AM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Excited to share our new @science.org paper! Led by postdocs Ruchao Peng and Xin Xu, we used cryo-EM/ET to reveal the influenza ribonucleoprotein complex structure and its strand-sliding mechanism for RNA synthesis, paving the way for new antivirals.
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Molecular basis of influenza ribonucleoprotein complex assembly and processive RNA synthesis
Influenza viruses replicate and transcribe their genome in the context of a conserved ribonucleoprotein (RNP) complex. By integrating cryo–electron microscopy single-particle analysis and cryo–electro...
www.science.org
May 15, 2025 at 7:51 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Exciting job opportunities!

Two postdoc positions are available in the Fodor Lab at
@dunnschool.bsky.social to study influenza virus transcription, genome replication, nuclear export and assembly.

More info: my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecru...
May 7, 2025 at 8:26 AM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Structure of the Nipah virus polymerase complex
Jonathan Grimes and collaborators
www.embopress.org/doi/full/10....
January 8, 2025 at 7:24 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Just published - pandemic influenza PB1 genes of avian origin reduce polymerase activity and virulence in low-pathogenic avian influenza viruses. Insights into host adaptation and zoonotic risk.
www.science.org/doi/abs/10.1...
Effect of pandemic influenza A virus PB1 genes of avian origin on viral RNA polymerase activity and pathogenicity
Past influenza pandemics contained polymerase genes from avian influenza viruses, affecting viral replication and pathogenicity.
www.science.org
December 14, 2024 at 5:28 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Excited to share our work describing a series of structures that allow us to propose a new model for Hantavirus genome replication by the viral L-protein. Another great experience with @loiccarrique.bsky.social @ben-nilsson-payant.bsky.social @efodor.bsky.social Jon Grimes.
doi.org/10.1371/jour...
Structural characterization of the full-length Hantaan virus polymerase
Author summary Hantaviruses are widely distributed viruses that can undergo zoonosis where they cause severe disease in humans. Old World hantaviruses, found predominantly in Asia and Europe, can caus...
doi.org
December 13, 2024 at 5:02 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Congratulations to our SPC facility user, Karthi Dhamotharan and the Schlundt Lab, for such an achievement on SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid protein and RNA binding 🦠🧬

Well done ! 👍

@embl.org @cssbhamburg.bsky.social
December 13, 2024 at 12:01 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Structural and molecular properties of mumps virus inclusion bodies www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Structural and molecular properties of mumps virus inclusion bodies
Mumps virus uses host RNAs containing G-quadruplex motif sequences to generate viral factories for viral RNA synthesis.
www.science.org
December 9, 2024 at 6:06 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Our new preprint from Briggs lab is out! We solved the in-virus #cryoEM structure of the HIV matrix protein by SPA. The structure led us to a discovery resolving a long mystery in HIV biology – a peptide SP2 triggers the maturation of the HIV matrix domain. A 🧵 1/x
Paper: tinyurl.com/c7szhtfa
November 12, 2024 at 9:04 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi
Thrilled to announce Boltz-1, the first open-source and commercially available model to achieve AlphaFold3-level accuracy on biomolecular structure prediction! An exciting collaboration with Jeremy, Saro, and an amazing team at MIT and Genesis Therapeutics. A thread!
November 17, 2024 at 4:20 PM
Reposted by Cecilia Rocchi