Assistant Professor at UCLA • #BWFPDEP Postdoc @Columbia • @SFSU @JohnsHopkins alum • Archaea fan • Metagenomic Editing of the gut and beyond ✂️🧬🦠
New York City
Joined April 2010
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1/n Metagenomics lets us read microbiomes in nature without cultivation, but writing (editing) them in their native context is still a major challenge.
Meet MetaEdit: a platform for pathway-scale metagenomic editing inside the gut microbiome. science.org/doi/10.1126/scie…
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
🏆Dr. Elaine Hsiao @pipethero was one of five @UCLA college faculty members recognized at the Inaugural UCLA College Lecture Awards. Dr. Hsiao, director of the Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center, studies the gut microbiome and its influence on the brain.
linkedin.com/posts/uclacolle…
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
1/5 Telomerase has long been linked to chromosome maintenance in eukaryotes. Now, we show that telomerase-like activity is also present in bacteria, shedding new light on its ancient origins.
Excited to share that our work on DRT10 is now out in @Nature!
nature.com/articles/s41586-0…
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Genome maintenance by telomerase is a fundamental process in nearly all eukaryotes. But where does it come from?
Today, we report the discovery of telomerase homologs in a family of antiviral RTs, revealing an unexpected evolutionary origin in bacteria.
doi.org/10.1101/2025.10.16.6…
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
We are thrilled and grateful to @NIH_ORWH & @NIDDK for continuing to support our SCORE Center’s research on sex differences in #IBS and also for supporting research studying sex differences & women’s health. 🙏
UCLA Health received $7.5M to renew its research center focused on sex differences in #IBS. It's part of the @NIH SCORE on Sex Differences Program & funded by Office of Research on Women’s Health & @NIDDK.
🌟Leads: @LinChangMD @pipethero @EmeranMayerMD
👉uclahealth.org/news/release/…
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
👏Dr. Donaldson @gp_donaldson received the prestigious @NIH Director's New Innovator Award. His lab is investigating Immunoglobulin A (IgA) & how it shapes the gut #microbiome and supports intestinal health. He is director of UCLA Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center Probiotic Core.
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
👏Dr. Devesha Kulkarni @devesha_k receives the prestigious @NIH Director's New Innovator Award. She is investigating how complement proteins help maintain intestinal health & support the gut's ability to repair itself after injury. She's a Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center member.
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Welcome back to LA, @tehhoyen! Delighted to have your curiosity, creativity, and enthusiasm for cool science in our GLMC community. 🥂 to many amazing discoveries ahead! 🚨 PSA: Don't miss joining this outstanding group!
Thrilled to be joining @dgsomucla and @UCLAGIHep as a member of the Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center. We engineer the gut microbiome in vivo (and more!), both to understand basic biology and to develop new therapeutics. Recruiting techs, grad students, and postdocs. Come join me!
Thrilled to be joining @dgsomucla and @UCLAGIHep as a member of the Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center. We engineer the gut microbiome in vivo (and more!), both to understand basic biology and to develop new therapeutics. Recruiting techs, grad students, and postdocs. Come join me!
Welcome Dr. Diego Rivera Gelsinger @tehhoyen to UCLA! The Rivera Gelsinger Lab engineers microbial communities by turning nature's mobile genetic elements into programmable tools. He's asst professor in human genetics & digestive disease & Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center member.
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Transformative opportunity for early career faculty @hhmi_science #FreemanHrabowski Scholars competition opens 11/3/2026 but you can get started NOW: view application components, establish eligibility, and unlock example applications and other resources hhmi.org/programs/freeman-hr…
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Just published! IStrons are a unique class of transposable elements that pack three distinct functions in one sequence. Here, we used pooled library mutagenesis and high-throughput sequencing to systematically map the sequence and structural features that govern these functions.
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
1/8 🚨 New preprint from the @SternbergLab & Jinek labs! CRISPR-associated transposases (CASTs) insert large DNA cargoes at precise genomic locations — no double-strand breaks needed.
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Yours truly is a proper scientist now!
TL;DR: we used AI to redesign parts of essential cell machinery with only 19 canonical amino acids instead of 20.
Why? Great thread by @harriswangnyc provides more context and details. Let me talk a bit about the AI design part of this. 1/
1/ Excited to share our new paper in Science: “Toward life with a 19-amino acid alphabet through generative artificial intelligence design.” @ColumbiaSysBio @ColumbiaBME @Columbia
science.org/doi/10.1126/scie… 🦠🧬🛠️🖥️💥
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
1/9 New preprint from the Sternberg Lab in collaboration with the Nishimasu Lab! We uncover how the DRT3 antiphage immune system pairs two reverse transcriptases, one RNA-templated and one protein-templated, to build a double-stranded DNA effector. doi.org/10.64898/2026.05.04.…
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Our lab is proud to present our latest work harnessing Bridge Recombinase for genome-scale editing in diverse bacteria, microbiome editing, and programmable horizontal gene transfer.
Bridge recombinase enables versatile rewriting of bacterial genomes biorxiv.org/content/10.64898… #biorxiv_synbio
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
1/ Excited to share our new paper in Science: “Toward life with a 19-amino acid alphabet through generative artificial intelligence design.” @ColumbiaSysBio @ColumbiaBME @Columbia
science.org/doi/10.1126/scie… 🦠🧬🛠️🖥️💥
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Our paper with Vijay Ramani is out today in @Nature.
We show that chromatin has a richer grammar than simple "open" or "closed" DNA. Using IDLI, we read 14 nucleosome structural states across single chromatin fibers and find that this grammar is actively written by transcription factors.
Today in @Nature, the @genophoria & Vijay Ramani labs reveal that our picture of how nucleosomes regulate DNA accessibility has been too simple. They find that over 85% of nucleosomes in mammalian cells are structurally distorted, with DNA partially accessible even while wrapped.
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
My first PhD student‘s paper on 5-color single-molecule imaging of co-transcriptional RNA folding is out in @ScienceMagazine Advances!
@GorKavan finds that #RNA modification enzymes, antisense oligos and ribosomal proteins re-route nascent RNA folding.
See EMBL post below!
(1/2) EMBL researchers have developed a microscopy technique that enables them to observe individual RNA molecules being produced and folding into different shapes.
Learn more: science.org/doi/10.1126/scia…
ALT Illustration showing RNA polymerase and four laser lights. Credit: Daniela Velasco/EMBL
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Out now! In collaboration with @LeifuChangLab, we uncover the molecular and structural underpinnings of CRISPR-Cas12f-like RNA-guided transcription systems!
Links to the articles in the following tweet:
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
I'm very excited to announce my official appointment as Chair of the Department of Systems Biology at @Columbia @ColumbiaMed @ColumbiaSysBio. Looking forward to more SysBio growth in NY!
systemsbiology.columbia.edu/
Diego Rivera Gelsinger retweeted
Introducing Foli-seq in @NatureBiotech today. Foli-seq can be used to measure gut-derived RNA from fecal matter (signals of immune, secretory & epithelial cells). We used this to map gut inflammation, drug response, and host-microbe interactions. 💩🧬💊🦠
nature.com/articles/s41587-0…