Publications | The Pleiner lab Membrane protein homeostasis and nanobody engineering @ Stanford Medicine

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Pleiner lab

All Publications:

Preprints:

(*denotes equal contribution co-first- and † denotes co-corresponding authorship)

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Stanton, M., Singal, B., Biswal, M., Agarwal, M., Scheuing, C. E., Vargas, G. D., Gao, A., Gifford, C. A. and Pleiner, T.† (2026) The ER membrane protein complex acts as a chaperone to promote the biogenesis of multi-bundle membrane proteins. bioRxiv https://doi.org/10.64898/2026.01.14.699575 (accepted at Nat. Struct. Mol. Biol.)

Top 1% preprint - QED

Callejas-Marín, A.†, Gonzalez, W., Pleiner, T., Huang, T.-H., de la Cruz, A., Pandey, A., Sánchez-Guardado, L., Jafar-Nejad, H., Voorhees, R.M., Lois, C.† (2025) Short disordered peptides are sufficient to convert proteins into mechanosensors that respond to physiological cellular forces. bioRxiv
https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.11.11.685779

Selected Publications:

(*denotes equal contribution co-first- and † denotes co-corresponding authorship)

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Evans, S. A., Chiu, C., Wilkinson, M. E.*, Li, D., Biswal, M., Strecker, J., Pleiner, T., Zhang, F., Gao, A.† (2026) Phage terminase recognition by the bacterial immune sensors Avs2 and Upx. Nature Communications https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-76315-8

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Stevens, T.A., Tomaleri, G.P., Hazu, M., Wei, S., Nguyen, V.N., DeKalb, C., Voorhees, R.M.† and Pleiner, T.† (2024) A nanobody-based strategy for rapid and scalable purification of native human protein complexes. Nature Protocols 19, 127–158.

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Solà Colom, M., Fu, Z., Güttler, T., Trakhanov, S., Srinivasan, V., Gregor, K., Pleiner, T. and Görlich, D. (2024) Nucleoporin-binding nanobodies that either track or inhibit nuclear pore complex assembly. EMBO Journal 43(11):2198-2232. doi: 10.1038/s44318-024-00081-w.

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Page, K.R., Nguyen, V.N.N., Pleiner, T.*, Pinton Tomaleri, G., Wang, M., Guna, A., Wang, T.Y., Chou, T.F., Voorhees, R. M. (2024) Role of a holo-insertase complex in the biogenesis of biophysically diverse ER membrane proteins. Molecular Cell 84(17):3302-3319.e11. doi: 10.1016/j.molcel.2024.08.005

Pleiner, T., Hazu, M., Pinton Tomaleri, G.*, Nguyen, V.N., Januszyk, K. and Voorhees, R.M. (2023) A selectivity filter in the ER membrane protein complex limits protein misinsertion at the ER. Journal of Cell Biology 222 e202212007. (On the cover)

JCB collection: Structural Biology 2024

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Pleiner, T.; Hazu, M.; Pinton Tomaleri, G.; Januszyk, K.; Oania, R.S.; Sweredoski, M.J.; Moradian, A.; Guna, A.; Voorhees, R.M. (2021) WNK1 is an assembly factor for the human ER membrane protein complex. Molecular Cell, 81, 2693-2704.e12.

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Pleiner, T.; Pinton Tomaleri, G.; Januszyk, K.*; Inglis, A.J.; Hazu, M.; Voorhees, R.M. (2020) Structural basis for membrane insertion by the human ER membrane protein complex. Science 369(6502):433-436.

Talk on Youtube

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Pleiner, T.†; Bates, M.†; Görlich, D.† (2018) A toolbox of anti-mouse and anti-rabbit IgG secondary nanobodies. Journal of Cell Biology 217(3):1143-1154.

JCB 65th Anniversary: Classic Methods

Animal Welfare Prize

JCB collection: The Year in Cell Biology 2018

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Aksu, M.; Pleiner, T.; Karaca, S.; Kappert, C.; Dehne, H.J.; Seibel, K.; Urlaub, H.; Bohnsack, M.; Görlich, D. (2018) Xpo7 is a broad-spectrum exportin and a nuclear import receptor. Journal of Cell Biology 217, 1143-1154.

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Göttfert, F.; Pleiner, T.; Heine, J.; Westphal, V.; Görlich, D.; Sahl, S.; Hell, S. (2017) Strong signal increase in STED fluorescence microscopy by imaging regions of subdiffraction extent. PNAS. 114(9):2125-2130.

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Pleiner, T.; Bates, M.; Trakhanov, S.; Lee, C.T.; Schliep, J. E.; Chug, H.; Böhning, M.; Stark, H.; Urlaub, H.; Görlich, D. (2015) Nanobodies: site-specific labeling for super-resolution imaging, rapid epitope-mapping and native protein complex isolation. eLife. 4; e11349.

Nature methods highlight

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Chug, H.; Trakhanov, S.; Hülsmann, B.; Pleiner, T.; Görlich, D. (2015) Crystal structure of the metazoan Nup62-Nup58-Nup54 nucleoporin complex. Science. 350(6256): 106-10.

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