Prof. Michael Lin (@MichaelLinLab) / X

Prof. Michael Lin

1,576 posts

Prof. Michael Lin

@MichaelLinLab

Stanford Neurobiology and Bioengineering Precision molecular design / synbiochem. Also @michaelzlin

Greenberg → Tsien →

Joined July 2022

Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Sep 5, 2024
Congrats to my friend and colleague Guosong Hong for his stunning and original discovery, published today in Science, on clearing tissues *in living animals* with a common food dye! The dye is tartrazine, used in Doritos! science.org/doi/10.1126/sc…
436K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Sep 20, 2024
Super-excited to reveal our latest fluorescent voltage indicator, ASAP5, now online @NeuroCellPress! ASAP5 features higher responsivity and kinetics, allowing detection of single synaptic transmission events. The link gives free access until 2024.11.09: authors.elsevier.com/a/1joYd3BtfH9B…
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Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Oct 27, 2024
This may be obvious to some but I'm now convinced: fierce competition for grants and papers is leading to low societal ROI (return on investment). Why, when competition should mean only the best-formulated and executed work is accepted for funding and high-profile publication?
85K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Jul 6, 2023
Today in @naturemethods: our new positively tuned voltage indicator, ASAP4e, for extended electrical recordings in the brain. ASAP4e achieves greater responsivity (>200% per 100mV vs 50% for other fluorescent voltage sensors) and better photostability.
A positively tuned voltage indicator for extended electrical recordings in the brain
From nature.com
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Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Oct 18, 2025
This is at once true and useful, and also what is wrong with science in the 21st century. Being a good scientist is about understanding a field well, thinking of unique hypothesis, and performing experiments carefully to address them. Being a *successful* scientist OTOH ...
Ali Max Erturk
@erturklab
Oct 16, 2025
I am often asked what the one skill is that young scientists should work on the most. My answer: your storytelling via presentations. The better you present, the more your ideas travel, the more doors open, and the more people want to work with you. A few tips: Have one clear
45K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Oct 18, 2025
Just submitted my 15th grant proposal of 2025. 2 hits and 5 rejections already, for a 29% hit rate. NIH funding rate this year will be under 5%; otherwise would have skipped most of the smaller ones. But applying for grants every 2-3 weeks is not preferable, to put it mildly.
28K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Sep 29, 2023
Stanford Neurobiology is hiring an assistant professor in any neuroscience area! We are a diverse and friendly group, and committed to staying that way, so people of all backgrounds are encouraged to apply! Reviews start 2023.11.01 URL: facultypositions.stanford.edu/en-us/job/4946… @StanfordBrain
32K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Dec 1, 2023
Looks like we finally have "the next GFP". Until now we had monomeric GFPs brighter than EGFP (mClover3, mNeonGreen, mGreenLantern) but with reduced photostability. In monomeric StayGold (mSG), there's finally an mGFP that is both brighter and more photostable. Brightness:
Rita Strack
@rita_strack
Nov 30, 2023
So excited to share this lovely paper from the Miyawaki lab on their monomeric StayGold variants! @michaelzlin and I were chatting at Janelia and he said we're in a second golden age of FP development. I believe it!
39K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Jul 27, 2024
Exciting times for voltage imaging! In a new study published today, our collaborators @attila_losonczy and @a_negrean find that behavior regulates electrical signals in neuronal dendrites in a structured but dynamic way.
Functional architecture of intracellular oscillations in hippocampal dendrites
From nature.com
12K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Nov 13, 2025
Head-mounted 2-photon miniscope voltage imaging! Weijian Yang's group at UC Davis sped up 2p scanning by multiplexing to achieve 400-Hz voltage imaging of ~20 neurons, using ASAP4e. These are the first freely moving single-cell voltage recordings as far as I know.
8.1K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Sep 25, 2024
Which monomeric GFP is the brightest and most photostable? A winner has just been announced, and it is mStayGold from the Miyawaki lab, edging out two other monomeric StayGold candidates.
biorxiv.org
Quantitative Comparison of Monomeric StayGold Variants Using Protein Nanocages in Living Cells
To standardize comparison of fluorescent proteins and independently determine which monomeric StayGold variant is best for live microscopy, we analyzed fluorescent protein tagged I3-01 peptides that...
15K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Feb 9, 2023
Out in @nchembio today: our work on cephalofurimazine, a new NanoLuc substrate. We get >20x more light from the brain than FLuc+luciferin, and perform through-skull imaging with our CaMBI activity indicator. Great work by @su_yichi together with @promega nature.com/articles/s4158…
10K
Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Oct 31, 2025
A reminder that association may not be causation. Also an example of how optogenetics allows causation to be probed, although that too is tricky as it's hard to know if an optogenetic stimulus recapitulates natural ones correctly. Maybe with better voltage imaging to guide it...
neurosock🧠Brain Chips🦾
@neurosock
Oct 30, 2025
Dopamine ≠ reward but turns out, also not the learning molecule we thought. If DA RPE is the emperor, this work SCREAMS it was running naked all the time. This paper got quite some attention recently. Let me explain why it is so relevant. Here is my toy model and notes:
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Prof. Michael Lin
@MichaelLinLab
Dec 6, 2022
Looking through 13 years of DNA samples to find a plasmid I may or may not have made in the Tsien Lab