Bob Erickson

Nucleotide-level linkage of transcriptional elongation and polyadenylation

eLife · 2022-11-24 · 26 citations

Alternative polyadenylation yields many mRNA isoforms whose 3' termini occur disproportionately in clusters within 3' untranslated regions. Previously, we showed that profiles of poly(A) site usage are regulated by the rate of transcriptional elongation by RNA polymerase (Pol) II (Geisberg et al., 2020). Pol II derivatives with slow elongation rates confer an upstream-shifted poly(A) profile, whereas fast Pol II strains confer a downstream-shifted poly(A) profile. Within yeast isoform clusters,…

Coronal Heating as Determined by the Solar Flare Frequency Distribution Obtained by Aggregating Case Studies

The Astrophysical Journal · 2023 · 7 citations

Abstract Flare frequency distributions represent a key approach to addressing one of the largest problems in solar and stellar physics: determining the mechanism that counterintuitively heats coronae to temperatures that are orders of magnitude hotter than the corresponding photospheres. It is widely accepted that the magnetic field is responsible for the heating, but there are two competing mechanisms that could explain it: nanoflares or Alfvén waves. To date, neither can be directly observed.…

Shape-Kit: A Design Toolkit for Crafting On-Body Expressive Haptics

2025-04-24 · 3 citations

Driven by the vision of everyday haptics, the HCI community is advocating for "design touch first" and investigating "how to touch well." However, a gap remains between the exploratory nature of haptic design and technical reproducibility. We present Shape-Kit, a hybrid design toolkit embodying our "crafting haptics" metaphor, where hand touch is transduced into dynamic pin-based sensations that can be freely explored across the body. An ad-hoc tracking module captures and digitizes these patter…

Mediator kinase inhibition suppresses hyperactive interferon signaling in Down syndrome

eLife · 2024-08-14 · 2 citations

Hyperactive interferon (IFN) signaling is a hallmark of Down syndrome (DS), a condition caused by Trisomy 21 (T21); strategies that normalize IFN signaling could benefit this population. Mediator-associated kinases CDK8 and CDK19 drive inflammatory responses through incompletely understood mechanisms. Using sibling-matched cell lines with/without T21, we investigated Mediator kinase function in the context of hyperactive IFN in DS over a 75 min to 24 hr timeframe. Activation of IFN-response gene…

Demonstrating Shape-Kit: A Design Toolkit for Crafting On-Body Expressive Haptics

2025-04-23 · 1 citations