Asaf Levy
@asaflevylab
Interested in computational biology, microbial toxins, plant microbiome, and microbial adaptation to different hosts. PI at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Expressing my personal opinions.
The pope promotes people to saints after having evidence for their miracles. Pope Leo already canonized 9 people in his short term. Pope Francis: more than 60. And I am thinking about this graph
We're recruiting a fungal biologist to our friendly department at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Rehovot, Israel. For details contact our chair. Talented non-Israli applicants are welcome to apply. See below.
From the lead authors of Haimlich S. et al. 2024 and Bograd A. et al. 2025 The lab's best achievement till now!
Anusha Majumder from Sahar Melamed's lab @saharmelamed.bsky.social identified sRNAs in P. putida that affects plant growth.
Amazing group of Wolf Prize in Agriculture awardees (2020, 2024,2025) today at the Hebrew Univeristy faculty of agriculture. In the picture: Elliot Meyerowitz Venkatesan Sundaresan Brian Staskawicz Jonathan D. G. Jones Caroline Dean Missing: Jeffery Dangl (presenting from home) The late Joanne Chory
The Natufian culture lived in the area of today's Israel and Lebanon from 15,000–11,500 Before Present. In the Eynan site people discovered a burial of 45 yo woman and her puppy, which is the oldest physical evidence for dog domestication. Published in Nature in 1978 www.nature.com/articles/276...
@aaronwhiteley.bsky.social Aaron Whiteley gave a great talk on antiphage defense as part of our microbiology journal club.
I love it when the mountain in the background is actually in altitude 98m below sea level (Mt. Izrach), Judea desert. And lots of wild flowers after a rainy spring. With @idane.bsky.social and other friends
Nicotine was first isolated in 1828. It took **nearly 200 years** to complete the nicotine biosynthesis pathway. The authors reconstituted this metabolon both in vitro and heterologously in vivo. A pea expressing the genes became insecticidal to Spodoptera larvae. www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
One day someone will rigorously quantify the % of carbon exuded to the soil by different plant roots. Until the time comes we will keep throwing imaginary numbers to the air, ranging between 10% to 40%.
Southern Judea desert gets 100-150 mm of rain annually but if you're lucky enough you get to see the water in a stunning powerful flash flood. This year Nakhal Khemar was flooding two days in a row.
RIP J. Michael Bishop, discoverer of the 1st human oncogene, c-Src. A gene that is being activated in many cancers.
Arabinose isn't only an inducer! @peterfineran.bsky.social gave a talk in our Hebrew Univ. microbiology journal club and mentioned his recent amazing finding that some phages add up to 3 arabinoses (!!) to their DNA to evade bacterial defense. Mahler et al. CHM 2025 www.cell.com/cell-host-mi...