Application Submitted to NSF GRFP | October 21, 2022 Masters student Aurora Vogel submitted an application for the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP). GRFP recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students who have demonstrated the potential to be high achieving scientists and engineers, early in their careers. Vogel is investigating the geometry of conical capsids (like HIV) in the Luque lab and is a prospective Ph.D. student in Mathematics.
Invited seminar at SDSU | September 14, 2022 Masters student Aurora Vogel was an invited speaker in the Fall 2022 seminar series at San Diego State University (SDSU). Aurora shared her current research progress in developing a general geometric framework for describing viral architectures. The seminar was hosted by Professor Chris O'Neill.
Invited seminar at UM| August 29, 2022 Principal Investigator, Dr. Antoni Luque, was the first invited speaker in the Fall 2022 seminar series of the Department of Biology at the University of Miami (UM). Dr. Luque shared the lab's progress in bridging the biophysics and evolution of viral capsids. The seminar was hosted by Prof. Alex Wilson , and it was followed by a lunch with graduate students.
Invited seminar at FAME, Flinders University, Australia | August 17, 2022 Principal Investigator, Dr. Antoni Luque, visited the Flinders Accelerator for Microbiome Exploration (FAME) at Flinders University (Adelaide, Australia) to present the latest progress of the Luque lab in the prediction of viral capsids from metagenomic data. The directors of the center, Professors Rob Edwards and Liz Dinsdale, hosted the research visit.
Poster contributions to the Virus of Microbes meeting | July 20, 2022 Postdoctoral researcher, Dr. Sergio Cobo-López presented a poster on his new approach to analyzing transient dynamics and its potential application to viral ecology at the international Virus of Microbes (VoM) meeting, which took place in Guimarães (Portugal). Principal investigator, Dr. Antoni Luque, also presented a poster highlighting the lab's progress in predicting the capsid architecture of viruses from metagenomic data.
Invited talk at the evolution series of El Colegio Nacional in Mexico City | June 10, 2022 Dr. Antoni Luque was invited by Professor Antonio Lazcano to contribute to the evolution series Los Viernes de la Evolución at El Colegio Nacional. Dr. Luque gave the first contribution in person in the cycle after the event had operated online for two years due to the pandemic. Dr. Luque shared his lab's research findings about identifying some of the most ancestral viruses related to tailed bacteriophages (the most abundant viruses on the planet). The talk was in Spanish and was titled "En busca de los virus perdidos". It was broadcasted across multiple Latin American countries and is available online on YouTube. After the talk, El Colegio Nacional published a press release summarizing the most relevant aspects of the talk and the conversation that followed with Prof. Lazcano and the audience.
CSRC colloquium | Feb 11, 2022 The principal investigator Dr. Antoni Luque presented the latest research on "Bridging the Biophysics and Evolution of Viruses" at the CSRC Colloquium. Dr. Luque introduced the generalized quasi-equivalence theory of icosahedral architectures as a framework to investigate systematically viral architectures and their protein components, showed how the physical relationship between the protein shell and genome of viruses has opened the door to characterize uncultured viruses, predict the existence of unknown viruses, and engineer new viruses from the environment and discussed a novel physical mechanism that may hold the key to how viruses explore different viral architectures. The talk can be viewed on the CSRC YouTube page.
Math is magical | Feb 11, 2022 Diana Lee's work associated with the Luque Lab and her journey to her first author paper identifying links between the shape and genes of virus has been highlighted by SDSU in the College of Sciences website. With data on hundreds of tail phages, the largest subgroup of bacteriophages, Diana refined a machine learning algorithm called a "random forest" which can predict which features of a virus's genome determine the shape of its shell.
Alumni publish capstone project findings on particle diffusion in mucus | Dec 17, 2021 Antonio Cobarrubia's work associated with the Luque lab has been highlighted by SDSU in the Department of Physics website. Antonio developed his senior thesis in physics in the lab in a collaborative project with two other physics students, Jarod Tall and Austin Crispin-Smith. The research article has been published in Frontiers in Physics, comparing more than 100 published experiments of diffusion of particles in mucus and introducing a new framework for the anomalous diffusion of these particles.
CSRC colloquium | Oct 16, 2022 The principal investigator Dr. Antoni Luque presented the latest research on "Structural Puzzles in Virology Solved with an Overarching Icosahedral Design Principle",at the CSRC Colloquium. The talk can be viewed on the CSRC YouTube page.