Publications
2026
Beiter, J.R.; Vasiliauskas, D.; Hodge, G.M.; Schneiderman, H.E.; Pillon, M.C.; Iyer, S.S.; Mendoza, M.C.; Lombardo, A.T.; Voth, G.A. The LOK C-Terminus is an IBAR-like Domain that Facilitates Membrane Binding and Ezrin Colocalization. Biophysical Journal. (2026).
Cole D. Masuga, Justin Van Riper, Monica C. Pillon. Rapid Production of Recombinant Human SLFN14 Ribonuclease and Stoichiometric Analysis by Mass Photometry. J Vis Exp. (2026) 228: e70393.
2025
Justin Van Riper, Bridget J. Corsaro, Monica C. Pillon. FASTK post-transcriptional regulators - a 'FAST-tracK' in mitochondrial gene expression. Biochemical Society Transactions. (2025) Oct 16:BST20253089.
Justin Van Riper; Arleth O. Martinez-Claros; Lie Wang; Hannah E. Schneiderman; Sweta Maheshwari; Monica C. Pillon. CryoEM structure of the SLFN14 endoribonuclease reveals insight into RNA binding and cleavage. Nature Communications. (2025) 16: 5848.
2024
Meena, J.K.; Wang, J.H.; Neill, N.J.; Keough, D.; Putluri, N.; Katsonis, P.; Koire, A.M.; Lee, H.; Bowling, E.A.; Tyagi, S.; Orellana, M.; Dominguez-Vidana, R.; Li, H.; Eagle, K.; Danan, C.; Chung, H.C.: Yang, A.D.; Wu W.; Kurley, S.J.; Ho, B.M.; Zoeller, J.R.; Olson, C.M.; Meerbrey, K.L.; Lichtarge, O.; Sreekumar, A.; Dacso, C.C.; Guddat, L.W.; Rejman, D.; Hockova, D.; Janeba, Z.; Simon, L.M.; Lin, C.Y.; Pillon, M.C.; Westbrook, T.F. MYC Induces Oncogenic Stress Through RNA Decay and Ribonucleotide Catabolism in Breast Cancer. Cancer Discovery. (2024) 14: 1699-1716.
2022
Schellenberg, M.J.*; Maheshwari, S.; Pillon, M.C.* (2022) Recombinant Protein Production Using Mammalian Expression Systems. In R. Bradshaw, P. Stahl, G. Hart (Ed). Encyclopedia of Cell Biology. Second Edition. (Invited book chapter) *Co-corresponding authors
2021
Frazier, M.N.; Dillard, L.B.; Krahn, J.M.; Perera, L.; Williams, J.G.; Wilson, I. M.; Stewart, Z.D.; Pillon, M.C.; Deterding, L.J.; Borgnia, M.J.; Stanley, R.E. Characterization of SARS2 Nsp15 Nuclease Activity Reveals it’s Mad About U. Nucleic Acids Research. (2021) 49: 10136-10149.
Pillon, M.C.*,§; Frazier, M.N.§; Dillard, L.B.§; Williams, J.G.; Kocaman, S.; Krahn, J.M.; Perera, L.; Hayne, C.K.; Gordon, J.; Stewart, Z.D.; Sobhany, M.; Deterding, L.J.; Hsu, A.L.; Dandey, V.P.; Borgnia, M.J.; Stanley, R.E.* Cryo-EM Structures of the SARS-CoV-2 Endoribonuclease Nsp15. Nature Communications. (2021) 12: 636. §Authors contributed equally. * Co-corresponding authors.
2020
Pillon, M.C.*; Gordon, J.; Frazier, M.N.; Stanley, R.E*. HEPN RNases – An Emerging Class of Functionally Distinct RNA Processing Enzymes. Critical Reviews in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. (2020) 1-30. DOI: 10.1080/10409238.2020.1856769 *Co-corresponding authors.
Frazier, M.N; Pillon, M.C.; Kocaman, S.; Gordon, J.; Stanley, R.E. Structural Overview of Macromolecular Machines Involved in Ribosome Biogenesis. Current Opinion in Structural Biology. (2020) 67: 51-60.
Pillon, M.C.§; Goslen, K.H.§; Gordon, J.; Wells, M.L.; Williams, J.G.; Stanley, R.E. It takes two Las1 HEPN endoribonuclease domains to cut the RNA correctly. The Journal of Biological Chemistry. (2020) 295: 5857-5870. §Authors contributed equally.
Pillon, M.C.; Stanley, R.E. Nonradioactive Assay to Measure Polynucleotide Phosphorylation of Small Nucleotide Substrates. J. Vis. Exp. (2020) 159: 10.3791/61258.
2019
Pillon, M.C.; Hsu, A.L.; Krahn, J.M.; Williams, J.G.; Goslen, K.H.; Sobhany, M.; Borgnia, M.J.; Stanley, R.E. Cryo-EM Reveals Active Site Coordination Within a Multienzyme pre-rRNA Processing Complex. Nat. Struct. Mol. Biol. (2019) 26: 830-839.
Pillon, M.C.; Lo, Y.H.; Stanley, R.E. IT’S 2 for the Price of 1: Multifaceted ITS2 Processing Machines in RNA and DNA Maintenance. DNA Repair. (2019) 81: 102653.
Gordon, J.; Pillon, M.C.*; Stanley, R.E.* Nol9 is a Spatial Regulator for the Human ITS2 pre-rRNA Processing Complex. J. Mol. Biol. (2019) 431: 3771-3786.* Co-corresponding authors.
Almawi, A.W.; Scotland, M.K.; Randall, J.R.; Liu, L.; Martin, H.K.; Sacre, L.; Shen, Y.; Pillon, M.C.; Simmons, L.A.; Sutton, M.D.; Guarné, A. Binding of the regulatory domain of MutL to the sliding b-clamp is species specific. Nucleic Acids Res. (2019) 47: 4831-4842.
Mok, M.C.Y.; Campalans, A.; Pillon, M.C.; Guarné, A.; Radicella, J.P.; Junop, M. Identification of an XRCC1 DNA binding activity essential for retention at sites of DNA damage. Scientific Reports. (2019) 9: 3095.
Liu, L.; Ortiz Castro, M.C.; Rodríguez González, J.; Pillon, M.C.; Guarné, A. The Endonuclease Domain of Bacillus subtilis MutL is Functionally Asymmetric. DNA Repair. (2019) 73: 1-6.
2018
Pillon, M.C.; Sobhany, M. and Stanley, R.E. Characterization of the Molecular Crosstalk within the Essential Grc3/Las1 pre-rRNA Processing Complex. RNA. (2018) 24: 721-738.
Lo, Y.H.; Pillon, M.C.; Stanley, R.E. Combining X-Ray Crystallography with Small Angle X-Ray Scattering to Model Unstructured Regions of Nsa1 from S. cerevisiae. J. Vis. Exp. (2018) 131: e56953.
Pillon, M.C. and Stanley, R.E. Nuclease integrated Kinase Super Assemblies (NiKs) and Their Role in RNA Processing. Curr. Genetics. (2018) 64: 183-190.
2017
Pillon, M.C. and Guarné, A. Complementary uses of small angle X-ray scattering and X-ray crystallography. Biochim Biophys Acta Proteins Proteom. (2017) 1865: 1623-1630.
Pillon, M.C.; Sobhany, M.; Borgnia, M.J.; Williams, J.G.; Stanley, R.E. Grc3 programs the essential endoribonuclease Las1 for specific RNA cleavage. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. (2017) 114: E5530-E5538.
Lo, Y.H; Romes, E.; Pillon, M.C.; Sobhany, M; Stanley, R.E. Structural analysis reveals features of ribosome assembly factor Nsa1/WDR74 important for localization and interaction with Rix7/NVL2. Structure. (2017) 25: 762-772.
2016
Wan, L.C.K.; Pillon, M.C.; Thevakumaran, N.; Sun, Y.; Chakrabartty, A.; Guarné, A.; Kurinov, I.; Durocher, D.; Sicheri, F. Structural and functional characterization of KEOPS dimerization by Pcc1 and its role in t6A biosynthesis. Nucleic Acids Res. (2016) 19: 6971-6980.
Stogios, P.J.; Cox, G.; Spanogiannopoulos, P.; Pillon, M.C.; Waglechner, N.; Skarina, T.; Koteva, K.; Guarné, A.; Savchenko, A. and Wright, G.D. Rifampin phosphotransferase is an unusual antibiotic resistance kinase. Nature Commun. (2016) 22: 11343-11354.
Lenhart, J.S.; Pillon, M.C.; Guarné, A.; Biteen, J.S. and Simmons, L.A. Mismatch repair in Gram-positive bacteria. Res. Microbiol. (2016) 167: 4-12.
2015
Pillon, M.C.; Babu, V.M.P., Randall, J.R., Cai, J., Simmons, L.A., Sutton, M.D. and Guarné, A. The sliding clamp tethers the MutL endonuclease domain to DNA. Nucleic Acid Res. (2015) 43: 10746-10759.
Zeqiraj, E.; Tian, L.; Piggott, C.A.; Pillon, M.C.; Duffy, N.M.; Ceccarelli, D.F.; Keszei, A.F.; Lorenzen, K.; Heck, A.J.R.; Kurinov, I.; Orlicky, S.; Guarné, A.; Greenberg, R.A. and Sicheri, F. Higher order assembly of BRCC36-KIAA0157 is required for DUB activity and biological function. Mol Cell. (2015) 59: 970-983.
2014
Huang, H.; Zeqiraj, E.; Dong, B.; Kant Jha, B.; Duffy, N.; Orlicky, S.; Thevakumaran, N.; Talukdar, M.; Pillon, M.C.; Ceccarelli, D.F.; Wan, L.; Juang, Y.; Mao, D.Y.L.; Gaughan, C.; Brinton, M.A.; Perelygin, A.A.; Kourinov, I.; Guarné, A.; Silverman, R.H.; Sicheri, F. Dimeric structure of pseudokinase RNase L bound to 2-5A reveals a basis for interferon induced antiviral activity. Mol Cell. (2014) 53: 221-234.
2013
Lenhart, J.S.§; Pillon, M.C.§; Guarné, A.; and Simmons, L.A. Trapping and visualizing intermediate steps in the mismatch repair pathway in vivo. Mol. Microbiol. (2013) 90: 680-698. §Authors contributed equally.
Pillon, M.C.; Dubinsky, M.; Johnston, R.N.; Liu, S.L. and Guarné, A. Characterization of the defects in the ATP lid of E. coli MutL that cause transient hypermutability. DNA Repair. (2013) 12: 864-869.
2011
Pillon, M.C.; Miller, J.H.; and Guarné, A. The endonuclease domain of MutL interacts with the β sliding clamp. DNA Repair. (2011) 10: 87-93.
2010
Pillon, M.C.; Lorenowicz, J.J.; Ukelmann, M.; Klocko, A.D.; Mitchell, R.R.; Chung, Y.S.; Modrich, P.; Walker, G.C.; Simmons, L.A.; Friedhoff, P.; and Guarné, A. Structure of the endonuclease domain of MutL: unlicensed to cut. Mol. Cell. (2010) 39: 145-151.