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developmental and stem cell biologists

February in preprints

Posted by , on 2 March 2020

Welcome to our monthly trawl for developmental biology (and related) preprints. 


February’s haul features blooming orchids, regenerating lungfish and human intestines, and also lots of interesting stuff in the ‘Research practice and education section’, from preprint impacts to the dominance of the English language in science.

They were hosted on bioRxiv and arXiv. Let us know if we missed anything. Use these links to get to the section you want:

 

Developmental biology

Patterning & signalling

Morphogenesis & mechanics

Genes & genomes

Stem cells, regeneration & disease modelling

Plant development

Evo-devo & evo
Cell biology
Modelling
Tools & resources
Research practice & education
Why not…

 

 

Developmental biology

| Patterning & signalling

Insulin-like signalling influences the coordination of Drosophila larval hemocyte number with body size
Daniel Bakopoulos, Lauren Forbes Beadle, Katherine M. Esposito, Christen K. Mirth, Coral G. Warr, Travis K. Johnson

 

Mitochondria regulate Drosophila intestinal stem cell differentiation through FOXO
Fan Zhang, Mehdi Pirooznia, Hong Xu

 

Ecdysone steroid hormone remote controls intestinal stem cell fate decisions via the PPARγ-homologue E75B in Drosophila
Lisa Zipper, Denise Jassmann, Bastian Görlich, Tobias Reiff

 

Hedgehog Signalling Modulates Glial Proteostasis and Lifespan
Andrew Rallis, Juan A. Navarro, Mathias Rass, Amélie Hu, Serge Birman, Stephan Schneuwly, Pascal P. Thérond

 

Drosophila larval epidermal cells from Pietra, et al.

 

How do Dachsous and Fat polarise cells in the larval abdomen of Drosophila?
Stefano Pietra, KangBo Ng, Peter A Lawrence, Jose Casal

 

Escargot is involved in labial and antennal imaginal disc development through two different developmental pathways.
Fernando Rosales, Ivan Sanchez-Diaz, Enrique Reynaud, Veronica Narvaez

 

Dpp and Hedgehog promote the Glial response to neuronal damage in the developing Drosophila Visual system
Sergio B. Velarde, Alvaro Quevedo, Carlos Estella, Antonio Baonza

 

The Drosophila FUS ortholog cabeza promotes adult founder myoblast selection by Xrp1-dependent regulation of FGF signaling
Marica Catinozzi, Moushami Mallik, Marie Frickenhaus, Marije Been, Céline Sijlmans, Divita Kulshrestha, Ioannis Alexopoulos, Manuela Weitkunat, Frank Schnorrer, Erik Storkebaum

 

A novel temporal identity window generates alternating cardinal motor neuron subtypes in a single progenitor lineage
Austin Seroka, Rita M Yazejian, Sen-Lin Lai, Chris Q Doe

 

Continual inactivation of genes involved in stem cell functional identity stabilizes progenitor commitment
Noemi Rives-Quinto, Hideyuki Komori, Derek H. Janssens, Shu Kondo, Qi Dai, Adrian W. Moore, Cheng-Yu Lee

 

Odd-skipped controls neurite morphology and affect cell survival in Drosophila Melanogaster CNS
Yeoh Sue Lynn, Alina Letzel, Clemence Bernard Hannah Somerfield, Kyle Kyser, Emily Lin, Amanda Roper, Yucen Yuan, Chloe Saunders, Mina Farag, Samual Colourous, Camilla W. Larsen

 

Sea urchin embryos from Floc’hlay, et al.

 

Deciphering and modelling the TGF-β signalling interplays specifying the dorsal-ventral axis of the sea urchin embryo
Swann Floc’hlay, Maria Dolores Molina, Céline Hernandez, Emmanuel Haillot, Morgane Thomas-Chollier, Thierry Lepage, Denis Thieffry

 

Growth factor-mediated coupling between lineage size and cell fate choice underlies robustness of mammalian development
Néstor Saiz, Laura Mora-Bitria, Shahadat Rahman, Hannah George, Jeremy P Herder, Jordi García-Ojalvo, Anna-Katerina Hadjantonakis

 

Loss of floor plate Netrin-1 impairs midline crossing of corticospinal axons and leads to mirror movements
Oriane Pourchet, Marie-Pierre Morel, Quentin Welniarz, Nadège Sarrazin, Fabio Marti, Nicolas Heck, Cécile Galléa, Mohamed Doulazmi, Sergi Roig Puiggros, Juan Antonio Moreno-Bravo, Marie Vidailhet, Alain Trembleau, Philippe Faure, Alain Chédotal, Emmanuel Roze, Isabelle Dusart

 

Control of spontaneous activity patterns by inhibitory signaling in the developing visual cortex
Alexandra H. Leighton, Gerrit J. Houwen, Juliette E. Cheyne, Paloma P. Maldonado, Fred De Winter, Christian Lohmann

 

XEN cells from Bérenger-Currias, et al.

 

Early neurulation recapitulated in assemblies of embryonic and extraembryonic cells
Noémie M. L. P. Bérenger-Currias, Maria Mircea, Esmée Adegeest, Patrick R. van den Berg, Marleen Feliksik, Mazène Hochane, Timon Idema, Sander J. Tans, Stefan Semrau

 

Moonlighting α-PheRS connects JAK/STAT with Notch signaling for intestinal homeostasis
Manh Tin Ho, Jiongming Lu, Beat Suter

 

Notch Signaling Commits Mesoderm to the Cardiac Lineage
Evan S. Bardot, Bharati Jadhav, Nadeera Wickramasinghe, Amélie Rezza, Michael Rendl, Andrew J. Sharp, Nicole C. Dubois

 

Activation of WNT signaling restores the facial deficits in a zebrafish with defects in cholesterol metabolism
Victoria L. Castro, Nayeli G. Reyes-Nava, Brianna B. Sanchez, Cesar G. Gonzalez, Anita M. Quintana

 

Zebrafish Kit ligands cooperate with erythropoietin to promote erythroid cell expansion
Jana Oltova, Ondrej Svoboda, Olga Machonova, Petra Svatonova, David Traver, Michal Kolar, Petr Bartunek

 

Bone morphogenetic protein signaling regulates Id1 mediated neural stem cell quiescence in the adult zebrafish brain via a phylogenetically conserved enhancer module
Gaoqun Zhang, Marco Ferg, Luisa Lubke, Masanari Takamiya, Tanja Beil, Victor Gourain, Nicolas Diotel, Uwe Strahle, Sepand Rastegar

 

The Hedgehog Co-Receptor BOC Differentially Regulates SHH Signaling During Craniofacial Development
Martha L. Echevarría-Andino, Benjamin L. Allen

 

Gain-of-function mutation in Gli3 causes ventricular septal defects
Antonia Wiegering, Paniz Adibi, Ulrich Rüther, Christoph Gerhardt

 

LSD1 represses a neonatal/reparative gene program in adult intestinal epithelium
Rosalie T. Zwiggelaar, Håvard T. Lindholm, Madeleine Fosslie, Marianne T. Pedersen, Yuki Ohta, Alberto Díez-Sánchez, Mara Martín-Alonso, Jenny Ostrop, Mami Matano, Naveen Parmar, Emilie Kvaløy, Roos R. Spanjers, Kamran Nazmi, Morten Rye, Finn Drabløs, Cheryl Arrowsmith, John Arne Dahl, Kim B. Jensen, Toshiro Sato, Menno J. Oudhoff

 

Foxg1 Organizes Cephalic Ectoderm to Repress Mandibular Fate, Regulate Apoptosis, Generate Choanae, Elaborate the Auxiliary Eye and Pattern the Upper Jaw
Claudia Compagnucci, Michael J. Depew

 

FGF2 modulates simultaneously the mode, the rate of division and the growth fraction in cultures of Radial Glia
Mario Ledesma-Terrón, Nuria Peralta-Cañadas, David G. Míguez

 

Mouse embryos from Lewandoski, et al.

 

Fgf4 is critical for maintaining Hes7 levels and Notch oscillations in the somite segmentation clock
Mark Lewandoski, Matthew J Anderson, Valentin Magidson, Ryoichiro Kageyama

 

Small-molecule inhibition of Lats kinases promotes Yap-dependent proliferation in postmitotic mammalian tissues
Nathaniel Kastan, Ksenia Gnedeva, Theresa Alisch, Aleksandra Petelski, David Huggins, Jeanne Chiaravalli, Alla Aharanov, Avraham Shakked, Eldad Tzahor, Aaron Nagiel, Neil Segil, Albert J. Hudspeth

 

Retinal sections from Masson, et al.

 

Yap haploinsufficiency leads to Müller cell dysfunction and late-onset cone dystrophy
Christel Masson, Diana Garcia-Garcia, Juliette Bitard, Elodie Grellier, Jerome E Roger, Muriel Perron

 

β-catenin-Mediated Wnt Signal Transduction Proceeds Through an Endocytosis-Independent Mechanism
Ellen Youngsoo Rim, Leigh Katherine Kinney, Roel Nusse

 

Frog cells from Mii, et al.’s preprint

 

Quantitative analyses reveal extracellular dynamics of Wnt ligands in Xenopus embryos
Yusuke Mii, Kenichi Nakazato, Chan-Gi Pack, Yasushi Sako, Atsushi Mochizuki, Shinji Takada, Masanori Taira

 

Defective heart chamber growth and myofibrillogenesis after knockout of adprhl1 gene function by targeted disruption of the ancestral catalytic active site
Stuart J. Smith, Norma Towers, Kim Demetriou, Timothy J. Mohun

 

Lgr5+ telocytes are a signaling hub at the intestinal villus tip
Keren Bahar Halpern, Hassan Massalha, Rachel K. Zwick, Andreas E. Moor, David Castillo-Azofeifa, Milena Rozenberg, Lydia Farack, Adi Egozi, Dan R. Miller, Inna Averbukh, Yotam Harnik, Noa Weinberg-Corem, Frederic J. de Sauvage, Ido Amit, Ophir D. Klein, Michal Shoshkes-Carmel, Shalev Itzkovitz

 

Vascular-Derived SPARC and SerpinE1 Regulate Interneuron Tangential Migration and Accelerate Functional Maturation of Human Stem Cell-Derived Interneurons
Matthieu Genestine, Daisy Ambriz, Gregg W. Crabtree, Anna Molotkova, Michael Quintero, Angeliki Mela, Saptarshi Biswas, Peter Canoll, Gunnar Hargus, Dritan Agalliu, Joseph A. Gogos, Edmund Au

 

Glial type specific regulation of CNS angiogenesis by HIFα-activated different signaling pathways
Sheng Zhang, Bokyung Kim, Xiaoqing Zhu, Xuehong Gui, Yan Wang, Zhaohui Lan, Preeti Prabhu, Kenneth Fond, Aijun Wang, Fuzheng Guo

 

A gatekeeping role of ESR2 to maintain the primordial follicle reserve
V. Praveen Chakravarthi, Subhra Ghosh, Katherine F. Roby, Michael W. Wolfe, M. A. Karim Rumi

 

The influence of maternal malnutrition on folate and inositol production and transport in the placenta and gut – a mechanism for fetal growth restriction and fetal disorders?
Elia Palladino, Tim Van Mieghem, Kristin L. Connor

 

Clustered γ-Protocadherins Regulate Cortical Interneuron Programmed Cell Death.
Walter R Mancia Leon, Julien Spatazza, Benjamin Rakela, Ankita Chatterjee, Viraj Pande, Tom Maniatis, Andrea R Hasenstaub, Michael P Stryker, Arturo Alvarez-Buylla

 

Urethral luminal epithelia are castration-insensitive progenitors of the proximal prostate
Diya B Joseph, Gervaise H Henry, Alicia Malewska, Nida Iqbal, Hannah M Ruetten, Anne E Turco, Lisa L Abler, Simran K Sandhu, Mark T Cadena, Venkat S Malladi, Jeffrey C Reese, Ryan J Mauck, Jeffrey C Gahan, Ryan C Hutchinson, Claus G Roehrborn, Linda A Baker, Chad M Vezina, Douglas W Strand

 

“Enteric glia as a source of neural progenitors in adult zebrafish”
Sarah McCallum, Yuuki Obata, Evangelia Fourli, Stefan Boeing, Christopher J Peddie, Qiling Xu, Stuart Horswell, Robert Kelsh, Lucy Collinson, David Wilkinson, Carmen Pin, Vassilis Pachnis, Tiffany Heanue

 

Zebrafish Kit ligands cooperate with erythropoietin to promote erythroid cell expansion
Jana Oltová, Ondřej Svoboda, Olga Machoňová, Petra Svatoňová, Michal Kolář, Petr Bartůněk

 

 

| Morphogenesis & mechanics

Cadherin clustering controls heterogeneous, asymmetric junction dynamics during vertebrate axis elongation
Robert Huebner, Abdul N Malmi-Kakkada, Sena Sarikaya, Shinuo Weng, Dave Thirumalai, John B. Wallingford

 

An asymmetry in the frequency and position of mitosis in the epiblast precedes gastrulation and suggests a role for mitotic rounding in cell delamination during primitive streak epithelial-mesenchymal transition
Evangéline Despin-Guitard, Navrita Mathiah, Matthew Stower, Wallis Nahaboo, Elif Sema Eski, Sumeet Pal Singh, Shankar Srinivas, Isabelle Migeotte

 

Coordinated assembly and release of adhesions builds apical junctional belts during de novo polarisation of an epithelial tube
Andrew Symonds, Clare Buckley, Charlotte Williams, Jon Clarke

 

Buckling of epithelium growing under spherical confinement
Anastasiya Trushko, Ilaria Di Meglio, Aziza Merzouki, Carles Blanch-Mercader, Shada Abuhattum, Jochen Guck, Kevin Alessandri, Pierre Nassoy, Karsten Kruse, Bastien Chopard, Aurélien Roux

 

Keratins and Plakin family cytolinker proteins control the length of epithelial microridge protrusions
Yasuko Inaba, Vasudha Chauhan, Aaron Paul van Loon, Lamia Saiyara Choudhury, Alvaro Sagasti

 

Mechanics regulate human embryonic stem cell self-organization to specify mesoderm
Jonathon M. Muncie, Nadia M.E. Ayad, Johnathon N. Lakins, Valerie M. Weaver

 

Hyaluronan-NK cell Interaction Controls the Primary Vascular Barrier during Early Pregnancy
Ron Hadas, Eran Gershon, Aviad Cohen, Sima Stroganov, Ofir Atrakchi, Shlomi Lazar, Ofra Golani, Bareket Dassa, Michal Elbaz, Gadi Cohen, Elena Kartvelishvily, Raya Eilam, Nava Dekel, Michal Neeman

 

Par3A and Par3B orchestrate podocyte architecture by regulating RhoA levels
Sybille Koehler, Johanna Odenthal, David Unnersjö Jess, Martin Höhne, Christian Jüngst, Ferdi Grawe, Martin Helmstädter, H. Henning Hagmann, Gerd Walz, Wilhelm Bloch, Carien Niessen, Bernhard Schermer, Andreas Wodarz, Barry Denholm, Thomas Benzing, Sandra Iden, Paul Thomas Brinkkoetter

 

Fish eyes from Aparicio, et al.

 

Photoreceptor progenitor dynamics in the zebrafish embryo retina and its modulation by primary cilia and N-cadherin
Gonzalo Aparicio, Magela Rodao, José L. Badano, Flavio R. Zolessi

 

Transcriptional control of apical protein clustering drives de novo cell polarity establishment in the early mouse embryo
Meng Zhu, Peizhe Wang, Charlotte E. Handford, Jie Na, Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz

 

TRIM67 Regulates Exocytic Mode and Neuronal Morphogenesis via SNAP47
Fabio L. Urbina, Shalini Menon, Dennis Goldfarb, M. Ben Major, Patrick Brennwald, Stephanie L. Gupton

 

Mouse embryos from Minegishi, et al.

 

Fluid flow-induced left-right asymmetric decay of Dand5 mRNA in the mouse embryo requires Bicc1-Ccr4 RNA degradation complex
Katsura Minegishi, Benjamin Rothé, Kaoru R. Komatsu, Hiroki Ono, Yayoi Ikawa, Hiromi Nishimura, Emi Miyashita, Katsuyoshi Takaoka, Kana Bando, Hiroshi Kiyonari, Tadashi Yamamoto, Hirohide Saito, Daniel B. Constam, Hiroshi Hamada

 

Mouse lymphovenous valves from Chen, et al.

 

RASA1-driven cellular export of collagen IV is required for the development of lymphovenous and venous valves in mice
Di Chen, Xin Geng, Philip E. Lapinski, Michael J. Davis, R. Sathish Srinivasan, Philip D. King

 

Prmt5 promotes vascular morphogenesis in zebrafish independently of its methyltransferase activity
Aurelie Quillien, Manon Boulet, Severine Ethuin, Laurence Vandel

 

S1PR1 regulates the quiescence of lymphatic vessels by inhibiting laminar shear stress-dependent VEGF-C signaling
Xin Geng, Keisuke Yanagida, Rachel Akwii, Dongwon Choi, Lijuan Chen, YenChun Ho, Boksik Cha, Md Riaj Mahamud, Karen Berman de Ruiz, Hirotake Ichise, Hong Chen, Joshua Wythe, Young-Kwon Hong, Constantinos Mikelis, Timothy Hla, R. Sathish Srinivasan

 

NRP2 as an emerging angiogenic player; promoting endothelial cell adhesion and migration by regulating recycling of α5 integrin
Abdullah AA Alghamdi, Christopher J Benwell, Samuel J Atkinson, Jordi Lambert, Stephen D Robinson

 

Paladin is a PI(4,5)P2 phosphoinositide phosphatase that regulates endosomal signaling and angiogenesis
Anja Nitzsche, Riikka Pietila, Chiara Testini, Takeshi Ninchoji, Ross O Smith, Elisabet Ekvarn, Jimmy Larsson, Francis P Roche, Isabel Egana, Suvi Jauhiainen, Philipp Berger, Lena Claesson-Welsh, Mats Hellstrom

 

Apical Constriction Reversal upon Mitotic Entry Underlies Different Morphogenetic Outcomes of Cell Division
Clint S. Ko, Prateek Kalakuntla, Adam C. Martin

 

The Pebble/Rho1/Anillin pathway controls polyploidization and axonal wrapping activity in the glial cells of the Drosophila eye
Lígia Tavares, Patrícia Gracio, Raquel Ramos, Rui Traquete, João B Relvas, Paulo S Pereira

 

Systematic functional analysis of Rab GTPases reveals limits of neuronal robustness in Drosophila
Friederike E. Kohrs, Ilsa-Maria Daumann, Bojana Pavlović, Eugene Jennifer Jin, Shih-Ching Lin, Fillip Port, F. Ridvan Kiral, Heike Wolfenberg, Thomas F. Mathejczyk, Chih-Chiang Chan, Michael Boutros, P. Robin Hiesinger

 

Cytoplasmic sharing through apical membrane remodeling
Nora G. Peterson, Benjamin M. Stormo, Kevin P. Schoenfelder, Juliet S. King, Rayson R. S. Lee, Donald T. Fox

 

The localization of chitin synthase mediates the patterned deposition of chitin in developing Drosophila bristles
Paul N. Adler

 

Worm neurites from Zheng, et al.

 

F-box protein MEC-15 promotes microtubule stability and neurite growth by antagonizing the HSP90 chaperone network in Caenorhabditis elegans
Chaogu Zheng, Emily Atlas, Ho Ming Terence Lee, Susan Laura Javier Jao, Ken C. Q. Nguyen, David H. Hall, Martin Chalfie

 

| Genes & genomes

Single-Cell Transcriptomics Reveals Early Emergence of Liver Parenchymal and Non-Parenchymal Cell Lineages

Jeremy Lotto, Sibyl Drissler, Rebecca Cullum, Wei Wei, Manu Setty, Erin M. Bell, Stéphane C. Boutet, Sonja Nowotschin, Ying-Yi Kuo, Vidur Garg, Dana Pe’er, Deanna M. Church, Anna-Katerina Hadjantonakis, Pamela A. Hoodless

 

Platynereis gene expression/EM overlay from Vergara et al.

Whole-body integration of gene expression and single-cell morphology
Hernando M. Vergara, Constantin Pape, Kimberly I. Meechan, Valentyna Zinchenko, Christel Genoud, Adrian A. Wanner, Benjamin Titze, Rachel M. Templin, Paola Y. Bertucci, Oleg Simakov, Pedro Machado, Emily L. Savage, Yannick Schwab, Rainer W. Friedrich, Anna Kreshuk, Christian Tischer, Detlev Arendt

 

Chick embryos from Morrison, et al.

 

Transcriptome profiling of the branchial arches reveals cell type composition and a conserved signature of neural crest cell invasion
Jason A Morrison, Rebecca McLennan, Jessica M Teddy, Allison R Scott, Jennifer C Kasemeier-Kulesa, Madelaine M Gogol, Paul M Kulesa

 

Combinatorial action of transcription factors in open chromatin contributes to early cellular heterogeneity and organizer mesendoderm specification
Ann Rose Bright, Siebe van Genesen, Qingqing Li, Simon J. van Heeringen, Alexia Grasso, Gert Jan C. Veenstra

 

New observations on non-coding RNAs involved in the dual translation system in zebrafish development
Timo M. Breit, Johanna F. B. Pagano, Pjotr L. van der Jagt, Ellis Mittring, Wim A. Ensink, Marina van Olst, Selina van Leeuwen, Wim de Leeuw, Ulrike Nehrdich, Herman P. Spaink, Han Rauwerda, Rob J. Dekker

 

Maternal- and somatic-type snoRNA expression and processing in zebrafish development
Johanna F.B. Pagano, Mauro D. Locati, Wim A Ensink, Marina van Olst, Selina van Leeuwen, Wim C. De Leeuw, Ulrike Nehrdich, Herman P Spaink, Han Rauwerda, Martijs J. Jonker, Rob J. Dekker, Timo M Breit

 

Zebrefish embryos from Gao, et al.

 

Pou5f3 and Sox19b select gene expression repertoire at Zygotic Genome Activation
Meijiang Gao, Marina Veil, Marcus Rosenblatt, Anna Gebhard, Helge Hass, Lenka Buryanova, Lev Y. Yampolsky, Björn Grüning, Jens Timmer, Daria Onichtchouk

 

Evolutionarily conserved regulation of embryonic fast-twitch skeletal muscle differentiation by Pbx factors
Gist H. Farr III, Bingsi Li, Maurizio Risolino, Nathan M. Johnson, Zizhen Yao, Robert M. Kao, Mark W. Majesky, Stephen J. Tapscott, Licia Selleri, Lisa Maves

 

Expression of a Barhl1a reporter in subsets of retinal ganglion cells and commissural neurons of the developing zebrafish brain
Shahad Albadri, Olivier Armant, Tairi Aljand-Geschwill, Filippo Del Bene, Matthias Carl, Uwe Straehle, Lucia Poggi

 

The GINS complex is required for the survival of rapidly proliferating retinal and tectal progenitor cells during zebrafish development
Máté Varga, Kitti Csályi, István Bertyák, Dóra K. Menyhárd, Richard J. Poole, Kara L. Cerveny, Dorottya Kövesdi, Balázs Barátki, Hannah Rouse, Zsuzsa Vad, Thomas A. Hawkins, Heather L. Stickney, Florencia Cavodeassi, Quenten Schwarz, Rodrigo M. Young, Stephen W. Wilson

 

Hnrnpul1 loss of function affects skeletal and limb development
Danielle L Blackwell, Sherri D Fraser, Oana Caluseriu, Claudia Vivori, Paul MK Gordon, Amanda V Tyndall, Ryan E Lamont, Jillian S Parboosingh, A Micheil Innes, François P Bernier, Sarah J Childs

 

Sox17 and β-catenin co-occupy Wnt-responsive enhancers to govern the endodermal gene regulatory network
Shreyasi Mukherjee, Praneet Chaturvedi, Scott A Rankin, Margaret B Fish, Marcin Wizla, Kitt D. Paraiso, Melissa MacDonald, Xiaoting Chen, Matthew T. Weirauch, Ira L. Blitz, Ken W.Y. Cho, Aaron Zorn

 

Characterising open chromatin identifies novel cis-regulatory elements important for paraxial mesoderm formation and axis extension
Gi Fay Mok, Leighton Folkes, Shannon Weldon, Eirini Maniou, Victor Martinez-Heredia, Alice Godden, Ruth Williams, Grant N. Wheeler, Simon Moxon, Andrea E. Münsterberg

 

3D Epigenomic Characterization Reveals Insights Into Gene Regulation and Lineage Specification During Corticogenesis
Michael Song, Mark-Phillip Pebworth, Xiaoyu Yang, Armen Abnousi, Changxu Fan, Jia Wen, Jonathan D. Rosen, Mayank NK Choudhary, Xiekui Cui, Ian R. Jones, Seth Bergenholtz, Ugomma C. Eze, Ivan Juric, Bingkun Li, Lenka Maliskova, Weifang Liu, Alex A. Pollen, Yun Li, Ting Wang, Ming Hu, Arnold R. Kriegstein, Yin Shen

 

Fetal human intestine from Czerwinski, et al.

 

In vitro and in vivo development of the human intestinal niche at single cell resolution
Michael Czerwinski, Emily M. Holloway, Yu-Hwai Tsai, Angeline Wu, Qianhui Yu, Josh Wu, Katherine D. Walton, Caden Sweet, Charlie Childs, Ian Glass, Barbara Treutlein, J. Gray Camp, Jason R. Spence

 

Single-cell sequencing of developing human gut reveals transcriptional links to childhood Crohn’s disease
Rasa Elmentaite, Alexander Ross, Kylie R. James, Daniel Ortmann, Tomas Gomes, Kenny Roberts, Komal Nayak, Liz Tuck, Omer Ali Bayraktar, Robert Heuschkel, Ludovic Vallier, Sarah A. Teichmann, Matthias Zilbauer

 

Prediction of meiosis-essential genes based upon the dynamic proteomes responsive to spermatogenesis
Kailun Fang, Qidan Li, Yu Wei, Jiaqi Shen, Wenhui Guo, Changyang Zhou, Ruoxi Wu, Wenqin Ying, Lu Yu, Jin Zi, Yuxing Zhang, Hui Yang, Siqi Liu, Charlie Degui Chen

 

Cytosine methylation dynamics during post-testicular sperm maturation in mammals
Carolina Galan, Ryan W. Serra, Fengyun Sun, Vera D. Rinaldi, Colin C. Conine, Oliver J. Rando

 

ATRIP protects progenitor cells against DNA damage in vivo
Gabriel E. Matos-Rodrigues, Paulius Grigaravicius, Bernard S. Lopez, Thomas Hofmann, Pierre-Olivier Frappart, Rodrigo A. P. Martins

 

A Casz1 – NuRD complex regulates temporal identity transitions in neural progenitors
Pierre Mattar, Christine Jolicoeur, Sujay Shah, Michel Cayouette

 

CHD4-NURD controls spermatogonia survival and differentiation
Rodrigo O. de Castro, Victor Goitea, Luciana Previato, Agustin Carbajal, Courtney T. Griffin, Roberto J. Pezza

 

Fine-tuning of the PAX-SIX-EYA-DACH network by multiple microRNAs controls embryo myogenesis
Camille Viaut, Andrea Munsterberg

 

Sp8 regulatory function in the limb bud ectoderm
Rocío Pérez-Gómez, Marc Fernández-Guerrero, Víctor Campa, Juan F. Lopez-Gimenez, Alvaro Rada-Iglesias, Maria A. Ros

 

The homeoprotein ENGRAILED-1 promotes motoneuron survival and motor functions
Stephanie E. Vargas Abonce, Mélanie Lebœuf, Kenneth L. Moya, Alain Prochiantz

 

DUX4 regulates oocyte to embryo transition in human
Sanna Vuoristo, Christel Hydén-Granskog, Masahito Yoshihara, Shruti Bhagat, Lisa Gawriyski, Eeva-Mari Jouhilahti, Anastassius Damdimopoulos, Vipin Ranga, Mahlet Tamirat, Mikko Huhtala, Kosuke Hashimoto, Kaarel Krjutškov, Gaëlle Recher, Sini Ezer, Priit Paluoja, Pauliina Paloviita, Yujiro Takegami, Ai Kanemaru, Karolina Lundin, Tomi Airenne, Timo Otonkoski, Juha S. Tapanainen, Hideya Kawaji, Yasuhiro Murakawa, Thomas R. Bürglin, Markku Varjosalo, Mark S. Johnson, Timo Tuuri, Shintaro Katayama, Juha Kere

 

Hnf4a-mediated regulation of proximal tubule progenitors in the mouse kidney
Sierra S. Marable, Eunah Chung, Joo-Seop Park

 

Redundant function of Ets1 and Ets2 in regulating M-phase progression in post-natal angiogenesis
Sankha Ghosh, Catherine B MarElia-Bennett, Blake E Hildreth III, Julia E Lefler, Sudarshana M Sharma, Michael C Ostrowski

 

Smchd1 is a maternal effect gene required for autosomal imprinting
Iromi Wanigasuriya, Quentin Gouil, Sarah A. Kinkel, Andrés Tapia del Fierro, Tamara Beck, Ellise E.A. Roper, Kelsey Breslin, Jessica Stringer, Karla Hutt, Heather J. Lee, Andrew Keniry, Matthew E. Ritchie, Marnie E. Blewitt

 

PEA15 loss of function and defective cerebral development in the domestic cat
Emily C. Graff, J. Nicholas Cochran, Christopher B. Kaelin, Kenneth Day, Heather L. Gray-Edwards, Rie Watanabe, Jey W. Koehler, Rebecca A. Falgoust, Jeremy W. Prokop, Richard M. Myers, Nancy R. Cox, Gregory S. Barsh, Douglas R. Martin, 99 Lives Consortium

 

Hmx3a does not require its homeodomain for its essential functions in spinal cord, ear and lateral line development
Samantha J. England, Gustavo A. Cerda, Angelica Kowalchuk, Taylor Sorice, Ginny Grieb, Katharine E. Lewis

 

OTX2 non-cell autonomous activity regulates inner retinal function
Raoul Torero-Ibad, Bilal Mahzar, Clémentine Vincent, Clémence Bernard, Julie Dégardin, Manuel Simonutti, Thomas Lamonerie, Ariel Di Nardo, Alain Prochiantz, Kenneth L. Moya

 

Antisense ncRNAs during early vertebrate development are divided in groups with distinct features
Sanjana Pillay, Hazu

 

RNA-seq and scRNA-seq reveal trajectory progression of the retinal ganglion cell lineage in wild-type and Atoh7-null retinas
Fuguo Wu, Jonathan E. Bard, Julien Kann, Donald Yergeau, Darshan Sapkota, Yichen Ge, Zihua Hu, Jie Wang, Tao Liu, Xiuqian Mu

 

Defective heart chamber growth and myofibrillogenesis after knockout of adprhl1 gene function by targeted disruption of the ancestral catalytic active site
Stuart J. Smith, Norma Towers, Kim Demetriou, Timothy J. Mohun

 

Worm germlines from Minogue, et al.

 

Drosha Regulates Oogenesis and microRNAs Germline Autonomously and Non-autonomously in C. elegans
Amanda L. Minogue, Kenneth A. Trimmer, Jacob H. Seemann, Awdhesh Kalia, Swathi Arur

 

The predicted RNA-binding protein ETR-1/CELF1 acts in muscles to regulate neuroblast migration in Caenorhabditis elegans
Matthew E. Ochs, Matthew P. Josephson, Erik A. Lundquist

 

Argonaute catalytic activity is required for maternal mRNA clearance in embryos
Piergiuseppe Quarato, Meetali Singh, Eric Cornes, Blaise Li, Loan Bourdon, Celine Didier, Germano Cecere

 

C. elegans nuclear RNAi factor SET-32 deposits the transgenerational heritable histone modification, H3K23me3
Lianna Schwartz-Orbach, Chenzhen Zhang, Simone Sidoli, Richa Amin, Diljeet Kaur, Anna Zhebrun, Julie Ni, Sam Guoping Gu

 

The ancestral C. elegans cuticle suppresses rol-1
Luke M. Noble, Asif Miah, Taniya Kaur, Matthew V. Rockman

 

The Hox transcription factor Ubx ensures somatic myogenesis by suppressing the mesodermal master regulator Twist
Katrin Domsch, Julia Schröder, Matthias Janeschik, Christoph Schaub, Ingrid Lohmann

 

Fly testes from Palacios, et al.

 

Importin-9 regulates chromosome segregation and packaging in Drosophila germ cells
Victor Palacios, Garrett C Kimble, Tina L. Tootle, Michael Buszczak

 

Differentiating Drosophila female germ cells initiate Polycomb silencing by altering PRC2 sampling
Steven Z DeLuca, Megha Ghildiyal, Wanbao Niu, Liang-Yu Pang, Allan C. Spradling

 

The Drosophila HP1 family is associated with active gene expression across chromatin contexts
John M. Schoelz, Justina X. Feng, Nicole C. Riddle

 

Transcriptome analysis of somatic cell populations in the Drosophila testis links metabolism and stemness
Silvana Hof-Michel, Christian Bökel

 

Intimate functional interactions between TGS1 and the Smn complex revealed by an analysis of the Drosophila eye development
Paolo Maccallini, Francesca Bavasso, Livia Scatolini, Elisabetta Bucciarelli, Gemma Noviello, Veronica Lisi, Valeria Palumbo, Simone D’Angeli, Stefano Cacchione, Giovanni Cenci, Laura Ciapponi, James G. Wakefield, Maurizio Gatti, Grazia Daniela Raffa

 

Developmentally-orchestrated mitochondrial processes prime the selection against harmful mtDNA mutations
Zhe Chen, Zong-Heng Wang, Guofeng Zhang, Christopher K. E. Bleck, Dillon J. Chung, Grey Madison, Eric Lindberg, Christian Combs, Robert S. Balaban, Hong Xu

 

Impact of gestational low-protein intake on embryonic kidney microRNA expression and in the nephron progenitor cells of the male offspring fetus
Letícia de Barros Sene, Íscia Lopes-Cendes, Wellerson Rodrigo Scarano, Adriana Zapparoli, José Antônio Rocha Gontijo, Patrícia Aline Boer

 

 

| Stem cells, regeneration & disease modelling

Generation of twenty four induced pluripotent stem cell lines from twenty four members of the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936
Jamie Toombs, Lindsay Panther, Loren Ornelas, Chunyan Liu, Emilda Gomez, Raquel Martín-Ibáñez, Simon R. Cox, Stuart J. Ritchie, Sarah E. Harris, Adele Taylor, Paul Redmond, Tom C. Russ, Lee Murphy, James D. Cooper, Karen Burr, Bhuvaneish T. Selvaraj, Cathy Browne, Clive N. Svendsen, Sally A. Cowley, Ian J. Deary, Siddharthan Chandran, Tara Spires-Jones, Dhruv Sareen

 

Airway epithelial cells from Hawkins, et al.

 

Derivation of Airway Basal Stem Cells from Human Pluripotent Stem Cells
Finn J. Hawkins, Shingo Suzuki, Mary Lou Beermann, Cristina Barillà, Ruobing Wang, Carlos Villacorta-Martin, Andrew Berical, J.C. Jean, Jake Le Suer, Chantelle Simone-Roach, Yang Tang, Thorsten M. Schlaeger, Ana M. Crane, Sarah X. L. Huang, Scott H. Randell, Andras Rab, Eric J. Sorscher, Amjad Horani, Steven L. Brody, Brian R. Davis, Darrell N. Kotton

 

Profiling of the reprogramome and quantification of fibroblast reprogramming to pluripotency
Kejin Hu, Lara Ianov, David Crossman

 

Cell-cell communication through FGF4 generates and maintains robust proportions of differentiated cell fates in embryonic stem cells
Dhruv Raina, Angel Stanoev, Azra Bahadori, Michelle Protzek, Aneta Koseska, Christian Schröter

 

Quantitative and molecular differences distinguish adult human medullary and extramedullary haematopoietic stem and progenitor cell landscapes
Nicole Mende, Hugo Bastos, Antonella Santoro, Kendig Sham, Krishnaa T Mahbubani, Abbie Curd, Hitoshi Takizawa, Nicola K Wilson, Bertie Gottgens, Kourosh Saeb-Parsy, Elisa Laurenti

 

Variation of human neural stem cells generating organizer states in vitro before committing to cortical excitatory or inhibitory neuronal fates
Nicola Micali, Suel-Kee Kim, Marcelo Diaz-Bustamante, Genevieve Stein-O’Brien, Seungmae Seo, Joo-Heon Shin, Brian G. Rash, Shaojie Ma, Yanhong Wang, Nicolas A. Olivares, Jon Arellano, Kristen R. Maynard, Elana J. Fertig, Alan J. Cross, Roland Burli, Nicholas J. Brandon, Daniel R. Weinberger, Joshua G. Chenoweth, Daniel J. Hoeppner, Nenad Sestan, Pasko Rakic, Carlo Colantuoni, Ronald D. McKay

 

Differential regulation of lineage commitment in human and mouse primed pluripotent stem cells by NuRD
Ramy Ragheb, Sarah Gharbi, Julie Cramard, Oluwaseun Ogundele, Susan Kloet, Thomas Burgold, Michiel Vermeulen, Nicola Reynolds, Brian Hendrich

 

Reprogramming of Human Cells to Pluripotency Induces CENP-A Chromatin Depletion
Inês Milagre, Carolina Pereira, Raquel Oliveira, Lars E.T. Jansen

 

Sequential enrichment at the nuclear periphery of H2A.Zac and H3K9me2 accompanies pluripotency loss in human embryonic stem cells
Georgia Rose Kafer, Regina Rillo-Bohn, Peter M. Carlton

 

Neural G0: a quiescent-like state found in neuroepithelial-derived cells and glioma
Heather M. Feldman, Chad M. Toledo, Sonali Arora, Pia Hoellerbauer, Philip Corrin, Lucas Carter, Megan Kufeld, Hamid Bolouri, Ryan Basom, Jeffrey Delrow, José L. McFaline-Figueroa, Cole Trapnell, Steven M. Pollard, Anoop Patel, Christopher L. Plaisier, Patrick J. Paddison

 

TGF-β inhibitor accelerates BMP4-induced cochlear gap junction formation during in vitro differentiation of embryonic stem cells
Ichiro Fukunaga, Cheng Chen, Yoko Oe, Keiko Danzaki, Sayaka Ohta, Akito Koike, Ayumi Fujimoto, Katsuhisa Ikeda, Kazusaku Kamiya

 

DOT1L Methyltransferase Activity Preserves SOX2-Enhancer Accessibility And Prevents Activation of Repressed Genes In Murine Stem Cells
F. Ferrari, L. Arrigoni, H. Franz, L. Butenko, E. Trompouki, T. Vogel, T. Manke

 

Trophectoderm Potency is Retained Exclusively in Human Naïve Cells
Ge Guo, Giuliano Giuseppe Stirparo, Stanley Strawbridge, Jian Yang, James Clarke, Meng Amy Li, Sam Myers, Buse Nurten Özel, Jennifer Nichols, Austin Smith

 

Continual inactivation of genes involved in stem cell functional identity stabilizes progenitor commitment
Noemi Quinto-Rives, Hideyuki Komori, Derek H. Janssens, Shu Kondo, Qi Dai, Adrian W. Moore, Cheng-Yu Lee

 

MicroRNA-dependent inhibition of PFN2 orchestrates ERK activation and pluripotent state transitions by regulating endocytosis
Carolyn Sangokoya, Robert Blelloch

 

iPSC-Derived Ovarian Tissue Restores Ovarian Function in Subfertile Mice and After Gonadotoxic Chemotherapy
K.M. Elias, N.W. Ng, K.U. Dam, A. Milne, E.R. Disler, A. Gockley, N. Holub, G.M. Church, E.S. Ginsburg, R.M. Anchan

 

Cryopreservation of midbrain dopaminergic neural cells differentiated from human embryonic stem cells
Nicola J Drummond, Karamjit Singh Dolt, Maurice A Canham, Peter Kilbride, George John Morris, Tilo Kunath

 

PDH Mediated Mitochondrial Respiration Controls the Speed of Muscle Stem Cell Activation in Muscle Repair and Aging
Manmeet H. Raval, Pin-Chung Cheng, Nicholas Guardino, Sanjana Ahsan, Hao Zhou, Rajiv Lochan Tiwari, Lu Wang, Andrew Chareunsouk, Maxwell Ederer, Ara B. Hwang, Matt Ellenberger, Rob Pepin, Daniel Raftery, Daniel Promislow, Keyue Shen, Andrew S. Brack, Joseph T. Rodgers

 

Accelerated cell cycles enable organ regeneration under developmental time constraints in the Drosophila hindgut
Erez Cohen, Donald T. Fox

 

Regenerating fish tails from Plzer, et al.

 

Foxm1 regulates neuronal progenitor fate during spinal cord regeneration
Diane Pelzer, Lauren S. Phipps, Raphael Thuret, Syed Murtuza Baker, Karel Dorey

 

Zebrafish hair cells from Zhang, et al.

 

Suppression of Inflammation Delays Hair Cell Regeneration and Functional Recovery Following Lateral Line Damage in Zebrafish Larvae
Ru Zhang, Xiao-Peng Liu, Ya-Juan Li, Ming Wang, Lin Chen, Bing Hu

 

Localized activation of ependymal progenitors induces EMT-mediated glial bridging after spinal cord injury
Lili Zhou, Brooke Burris, Ryan Mcadow, Mayssa H Mokalled

 

Epigenetic immune-modulation by Histone Deacetylase Activity (HDAC) of tissue and organ regeneration in Xenopsu laevis
Nathalia Pentagna, Felipe Soares dos Santos, Fernanda Martins de Almeida, José Garcia Abreu, Michael Levin, Katia Carneiro

 

Ultrafiltration Segregates Tissue Regenerative Stimuli Harboured Within and Independent of Extracellular Vesicles
TT Cooper, SE Sherman, T Dayarathna, GI Bell, Jun Ma, DM McRae, F Lagugné-Labarthet, SH Pasternak, GA Lajoie, DA Hess

 

Expression of dlx genes in the normal and regenerating brain of adult zebrafish.
Hellen Weinschutz Mendes, Mariam TAKTEK, Thomas DURET, Marc Ekker

 

Arid1a loss potentiates pancreatic β-cell regeneration through activation of EGF signaling
Cemre Celen, Jen-Chieh Chuang, Shunli Shen, Jordan E. Otto, Clayton K. Collings, Xin Luo, Lin Li, Yunguan Wang, Zixi Wang, Yuemeng Jia, Xuxu Sun, Ibrahim Nassour, Jiyoung Park, Alexandra Ghaben, Tao Wang, Sam C. Wang, Philipp E. Scherer, Cigall Kadoch, Hao Zhu

 

ARHGEF3 regulates skeletal muscle regeneration and strength through autophagy
Jae-Sung You, Nilmani Singh, Adriana Reyes-Ordonez, Nidhi Khanna, Zehua Bao, Huimin Zhao, Jie Chen

 

Cerebral organoid model reveals excessive proliferation of human caudal late interneuron progenitors in Tuberous Sclerosis Complex
Oliver L. Eichmüller, Nina S. Corsini, Ábel Vértesy, Theresa Scholl, Victoria-Elisabeth Gruber, Angela M. Peer, Julia Chu, Maria Novatchkova, Mercedes F. Paredes, Martha Feucht, Jürgen A. Knoblich

 

Altered patterning of interneuron progenitors in Down syndrome
Yathinder Giffin-Rao, Bennett Strand, Margaret Medo, Aratrika Keshan, Roger A. Daley Jr., Sruti Mohan, Samuel Dantienne, Bradley Levesque, Lindsey Amundson, Leslie Huang, Rebecca Reese, Daifeng Wang, Su-Chun Zhang, Anita Bhattacharyya

 

Lack of dcf1 leads to neuronal migration delay, axonal swollen and autism-related deficits
Ruili Feng, Yanlu Chen, Yangyang Sun, Guanghong Luo, Jianjian Guo, Qiang Liu, Jie Wu, Xiangchun Ju, Tieqiao Wen

 

Proteomic and phosphoproteomic analysis identifies novel liver-related signaling in retinal pigment epithelial cells during epithelial-mesenchymal transition
Joseph L. Mertz, Srinivas Sripathi, X

 

Direct reprogramming of astrocytes to neurons leads to functional recovery after stroke
Jessica Livingston, Tina Lee, Emerson Daniele, Clara Phillips, Alexandra Krassikova, Tom Enbar, Ines Kortebi, K.W. Annie Bang, Brennan Donville, Omadyor Ibragimov, Nadia Sachewsky, Cindi M Morshead, Maryam Faiz

 

Alzheimer’s disease-relevant tau modifications selectively impact neurodegeneration and mitophagy in a novel C. elegans single-copy transgenic model
Sanjib Guha, Sarah Fischer, Gail VW Johnson, Keith Nehrke

 

Single Cell Transcriptomics Reveals Dysregulated Cellular and Molecular Networks in a Fragile X Syndrome model
Elisa Donnard, Huan Shu, Manuel Garber

 

Mouse neurons from Amar, et al.

 

Autism-linked Cullin3 germline haploinsufficiency impacts cytoskeletal dynamics and cortical neurogenesis through RhoA signaling
Megha Amar, Akula Bala Pramod, Victor Munive Herrera, Nam-Kyung Yu, Lily R Qiu, Pan Zhang, Patricia Moran-Losada, Cleber A Trujillo, Jacob Ellegood, Jorge Urresti, Kevin Chau, Jolene Diedrich, Jiaye Chen, Jessica Gutierrez, Jonathan Sebat, Dhakshin Ramanathan, Jason P Lerch, John R Yates III, Alysson R Muotri, Lilia M Iakoucheva

 

Loss of epithelial polarity redirects Notch signaling and triggers a Xrp1 response during neoplastic growth in Drosophila
Rémi Logeay, Charles Géminard, Patrice Lassus, Diala Kantar, Lisa Héron-Milhavet, Bettina Fischer, Sarah J. Bray, Jacques Colinge, Alexandre Djiane

 

Genome-wide molecular effects of the neuropsychiatric 16p11 CNVs in an iPSC-to-iN neuronal model
Thomas R. Ward, Xianglong Zhang, Louis C. Leung, Bo Zhou, Kristin Muench, Julien G. Roth, Arineh Khechaduri, Melanie J. Plastini, Carol Charlton, Reenal Pattni, Steve Ho, Marcus Ho, Yiling Huang, Joachim F. Hallmayer, Phillippe Mourrain, Theo D. Palmer, Alexander E. Urban

 

ASH1L REGULATES THE STRUCTURAL DEVELOPMENT OF NEURONAL CIRCUITRY BY MODULATING BDNF/TrkB SIGNALING IN HUMAN NEURONS
Seon H Cheon, Allison M Culver, Anna M Bagnell, Foster D Ritchie, Janay M Clytus, Mykayla McCord, Carin M Pappendorp, Evelyn Chukwurah, Austin J Smith, Mara H Cowen, Pankaj S Ghate, Shannon W Davis, Judy S Liu, Sofia Lizarraga

 

Successful Correction of ALD Patient-derived iPSCs Using CRISPR/Cas9
Eul Sik Jung, Zhejiu Quan, Mi-Yoon Chang, Wonjun Hong, Ji Hun Kim, Seung Hyun Kim, Seungkwon You, Dae-Sung Kim, Jiho Jang, Sang-Hun Lee, Hyongbum (Henry) Kim, Hoon Chul Kang

 

 

| Plant development

Hook shape of growing leaves results from an active regulation
Mathieu Rivière, Yoann Corre, Alexis Peaucelle, Julien Derr, Stéphane Douady

 

Co-expression clustering across flower development identifies modules for diverse floral forms in Achimenes (Gesneriaceae)
Wade R Roberts, Eric H Roalson

 

Orchid flowers from Chen, et al.

 

Ancestral duplicated DL/CRC orthologs display function on orchid reproductive organ innovation
You-Yi Chen, Yu-Yun Hsiao, Chung-I Li, Chuan-Ming Yeh, Nobutaka Mitsuda, Hong-xing Yang, Chi-Chou Chiu, Song-Bin Chang, Zhong-Jian Liu, Wen-Chieh Tsai

 

Protein complex stoichiometry and expression dynamics of transcription factors modulate stem cell division
Natalie M. Clark, Adam P. Fisher, Barbara Berckmans, Lisa Van den Broeck, Emily C. Nelson, Thomas T. Nguyen, Estefano Bustillo-Avendaño, Sophia G. Zebell, Miguel Moreno-Risueno, Rüdiger Simon, Kimberly L. Gallagher, Rosangela Sozzani

 

ERECTA family signaling constrains CLAVATA3 and WUSCHEL to the center of the shoot apical meristem
Liang Zhang, Daniel DeGennaro, Guangzhong Lin, Jijie Chai, Elena D. Shpak

 

Arabidopsis internodes from Shi, et al.

 

Tissue-specific transcriptome profiling of the Arabidopsis thaliana inflorescence stem reveals local cellular signatures.
Dongbo Shi, Virginie Jouannet, Javier Agusti, Verena Kaul, Victor Levitsky, Pablo Sanchez, Victoria V Mironova, Thomas Greb

 

A non-canonical histone acetyltransferase targets intragenic enhancers and regulates plant architecture
Xueyong Yang, Jianbin Yan, Zhen Zhang, Tao Lin, Tongxu Xin, Bowen Wang, Shenhao Wang, Jicheng Zhao, Zhonghua Zhang, William J. Lucas, Guohong Li, Sanwen Huang

 

Global Dynamic Molecular Profiles of Stomatal Lineage Cell Development by Single-Cell RNA Sequencing
Zhixin Liu, Yaping Zhou, Jinggong Guo, Jiaoai Li, Zixia Tian, Zhinan Zhu, Jiajing Wang, Rui Wu, Bo Zhang, Yongjian Hu, Yijing Sun, Yan Shangguan, Weiqiang Li, Tao Li, Yunhe Hu, Chenxi Guo, Jean-David Rochaix, Yuchen Miao, Xuwu Sun

 

DRT111/SFPS splicing factor controls ABA sensitivity in Arabidopsis seed development and germination
Paola Punzo, Alessandra Ruggiero, Marco Possenti, Giorgio Perrella, Roberta Nurcato, Antonello Costa, Giorgio Morelli, Stefania Grillo, Giorgia Batelli

 

GSK3 activity is a cell fate switch that balances the ratio of vascular cell type
Takayuki Tamaki, Satoyo Oya, Makiko Naito, Yasuko Ozawa, Tomoyuki Furuya, Masato Saito, Mayuko Sato, Mayumi Wakazaki, Kiminori Toyooka, Hiroo Fukuda, Ykä Helariutta, Yuki Kondo

 

Vegetative nuclear positioning is required for calcium and ROS signaling in Arabidopsis pollen tubes
Morgan Moser, Andrew Kirkpatrick, Norman Reid Groves, Iris Meier

 

Perturbation of GABA Biosynthesis Links Cell Cycle to Control Arabidopsis thaliana Leaf Development
Yaxin Gong, Han Yue, Yu Xiang, Guanghui Yu

 

Arabidopsis hypocotyls from Schneider, et al.

 

Long-term single-cell imaging and simulations of microtubules reveal driving forces for wall pattering during proto-xylem development
René Schneider, Kris van ’t Klooster, Kelsey Picard, Jasper van der Gucht, Taku Demura, Marcel Janson, Arun Sampathkumar, Eva E. Deinum, Tijs Ketelaar, Staffan Persson

 

The Arabidopsis gene RGO mediates cytokinin responses and increases seed yield
Jhadeswar Murmu, Ghislaine Allard, Denise Chabot, Eiji Nambara, Raju Datla, Shelley Hepworth, Rajagopal Subramaniam, Jas Singh

 

SPAs promote thermomorphogenesis via regulating the phyB-PIF4 module in Arabidopsis
Sanghwa Lee, Inyup Paik, Enamul Huq

 

Genomic evidence reveals SPA-regulated developmental and metabolic pathways in dark-grown Arabidopsis seedlings
Vinh Ngoc Pham, Inyup Paik, Ute Hoecker, Enamul Huq

 

Class III peroxidases PRX01, PRX44, and PRX73 potentially target extensins during root hair growth in Arabidopsis thaliana
Eliana Marzol, Cecilia Borassi, Philippe Ranocha, Ariel. A. Aptekman, Mauro Bringas, Janice Pennington, Julio Paez-Valencia, Javier Martínez Pacheco, Diana Rosa Rodríguez Garcia, Yossmayer del Carmen Rondón Guerrero, Mariana Carignani, Silvina Mangano, Margaret Fleming, John W. Mishler-Elmore, Francisca Blanco-Herrera, Patricia Bedinger, Christophe Dunand, Luciana Capece, Alejandro D. Nadra, Michael Held, Marisa Otegui, José M. Estevez

 

Golgi-localized exo-β1,3-galactosidases involved in AGP modification and root cell expansion in Arabidopsis
Pieter Nibbering, Bent L. Petersen, Mohammed Saddik Motawia, Bodil Jørgensen, Peter Ulvskov, Totte Niittylä

 

Arabidopsis AZG2, an auxin induced putative cytokinin transporter, regulates lateral root emergence
Tomás M. Tessi, Sabine Brumm, Eva Winklbauer, Benjamin Schumacher, Carlos I. Lescano, Claudio A. González, Dierk Wanke, Verónica G. Maurino, Klaus Harter, Marcelo Desimone

 

Plastid EF-Tu Regulates Root Development through Both the ATM Pathway and GUN1
Pengcheng Li, Junjie Ma, Xueping Sun, Chuanzhi Zhao, Changle Ma, Xingjun Wang

 

Retrograde induction of phyB orchestrates ethylene-auxin hierarchy to regulate growth
Jishan Jiang, Yanmei Xiao, Wei Hu, Hao Chen, Liping Zeng, Haiyan Ke, Franck A. Ditengou, Upendra Devisetty, Klaus Palme, Julin Maloof, Katayoon Dehesh

 

KIX8 and KIX9 are conserved repressors of organ size in the asterid species tomato
Gwen Swinnen, Alexandra Baekelandt, Rebecca De Clercq, Jan Van Doorsselaere, Nathalie Gonzalez, Dirk Inzé, Alain Goossens, Laurens Pauwels

 

The FUSED LEAVES1/ADHERENT1 Regulatory Module Is Required For Maize Cuticle Development And Organ Separation
Xue Liu, Richard Bourgault, Josh Strable, Mary Galli, Zongliang Chen, Jiaqiang Dong, Isabel Molina, Andrea Gallavotti

 

 

Evo-devo & evo

Lungfish tails from Verissimo, et al.

The West African lungfish provides insights into the evolution of tetrapod tail regeneration
Kellen Matos Verissimo, Louise Neiva Perez, Aline Cutrim Dragalzew, Gayani Senevirathne, Sylvain Darnet, Wainna Renata Barroso Mendes, Ciro Ariel dos Santos Neves, Erika Monteiro dos Santos, Cassia Nazare de Sousa Moraes, Neil Shubin, Nadia Belinda Frobisch, Josane de Freitas Sousa, Igor Schneider

 

Multi-organ transcriptomic landscape of Ambystoma velasci metamorphosis
Palacios-Martínez Janet, Caballero-Pérez Juan, Espinal-Centeno Annie, Marquez-Chavoya Gilberto, Lomelí Hilda, Salas-Vidal Enrique, Schnabel Denhi, Chimal-Monroy Jesus, Cruz-Ramírez Alfredo

 

Bicaudal C is required for the function of the follicular epithelium during oogenesis in Rhodnius prolixus
Agustina Pascual, Emiliano S. Vilardo, Catalina Taibo, Julia Sabio y García, Rolando Rivera Pomar

 

Unravelling the developmental and functional significance of an ancient Argonaute duplication
Arie Fridrich, Vengamanaidu Modepalli, Magda Lewandowska, Reuven Aharoni, Yehu Moran

 

Comparative transcriptomics across nematode life cycles reveal gene expression conservation and correlated evolution in adjacent developmental stages
Min R. Lu, Cheng-Kuo Lai, Ben-Yang Liao, Isheng Jason Tsai

 

MicroRNA clusters integrate evolutionary constraints on expression and target affinities: the miR-6/5/4/286/3/309 cluster in Drosophila leg development
Zhe Qu, Wing Chung Yiu, Ho Yin Yip, Wenyan Nong, Clare W.C. Yu, Ivy H.T. Lee, Annette Y.P. Wong, Nicola W.Y. Wong, Fiona K.M. Cheung, Ting Fung Chan, Kwok Fai Lau, Silin Zhong, Ka Hou Chu, Stephen S. Tobe, David E.K. Ferrier, William G. Bendena, Jerome H.L. Hui

 

Choanoflagellates from Booth and King

 

Genome editing enables reverse genetics of multicellular development in the choanoflagellate Salpingoeca rosetta
David S Booth, Nicole King

 

Integrin-mediated adhesion in the unicellular holozoan Capsaspora owczarzaki
Helena Parra-Acero, Matija Harcet, Núria Sánchez-Pons, Elena Casacuberta, Nicholas H. Brown, Omaya Dudin, Iñaki Ruiz-Trillo

 

Meta-population structure and the evolutionary transition to multicellularity
Caroline J Rose, Katrin Hammerschmidt, Yuriy Pichugin, Paul B Rainey

 

The genomic basis of animal origins: a chromosomal perspective from the sponge Ephydatia muelleri
Nathan James Kenny, Warren R Francis, Ramón E Rivera-Vicéns, Ksenia Juravel, Alex de Mendoza, Cristina Díez-Vives, Ryan Lister, Luis Bezares-Calderon, Lauren Grombacher, Maša Roller, Lael D Barlow, Sara Camilli, Joseph F Ryan, Gert Wörheide, April L Hill, Ana Riesgo, Sally Leys

 

Tracing the origin of a new organ by inferring the genetic basis of rumen evolution
Xiangyu Pan, Yu Wang, Zongjun Li, Xianqing Chen, Rasmus Heller, Nini Wang, Chen Zhao, Yudong Cai, Han Xu, Songhai Li, Ming Li, Cunyuan Li, Shengwei Hu, Hui Li, Kun Wang, Lei Chen, Bin Wei, Zhuqing Zheng, Weiwei Fu, Yue Yang, Tingting Zhang, Zhuoting Hou, Yueyang Yan, Xiaoyang Lv, Wei Sun, Xinyu Li, Shisheng Huang, Lixiang Liu, Shengyong Mao, Wenqing Liu, Jinlian Hua, Zhipeng Li, Guojie Zhang, Yulin Chen, Xihong Wang, Qiang Qiu, Brian P Dalrymple, Wen Wang, Yu Jiang

 

Cooption of polyalanine tract into a repressor domain in the mammalian transcription factor HoxA11
Vincent J Lynch, Gunter Wagner

 

Long-term experimental evolution reveals purifying selection on piRNA-mediated control of transposable element expression
Ulfar Bergthorsson, Caroline J. Sheeba, Anke Konrad, Tony Belicard, Toni Beltran, Vaishali Katju, Peter Sarkies

 

Fly wing evolution explained by a neutral model with mutational pleiotropy
Daohan Jiang, Jianzhi George Zhang

 

Parent of origin gene expression in the bumblebee, Bombus terrestris, supports Haig’s kinship theory for the evolution of genomic imprinting.
Hollie Marshall, Jelle S van Zweden, Anneleen Van Geystelen, Kristof Benaets, Felix Wäckers, Eamonn B Mallon, Tom Wenseleers

 

Trans-generational effect of protein restricted diet on adult body and wing size of Drosophila melanogaster
Sudhakar Krittika, Pankaj Yadav

 

Sex-specific transgenerational plasticity in threespined sticklebacks
Jennifer K Hellmann, Syed Abbas Bukhari, Jack Deno, Alison M Bell

 

Grandpaternal effects are lineage- and sex-specific in threespined sticklebacks
Jennifer K Hellmann, Erika R Carlson, Alison M Bell

 

Cell biology

EXOSC10 sculpts the transcriptome during the growth-to-maturation transition in mouse oocytes
Di Wu, Jurrien Dean

 

A meiosis-specific factor MRM/C19orf57 modulates localization of RAD51 and DMC1 recombinases to DSBs in mouse meiotic recombination
Kazumasa Takemoto, Naoki Tani, Yuki Takada, Sayoko Fujimura, Nobuhiro Tanno, Mariko Yamane, Kaho Okamura, Michihiko Sugimoto, Kimi Araki, Kei-ichiro Ishiguro

 

C. elegans STORM from Köhler, et al.

 

The interaction of crossover formation and the dynamic architecture of the synaptonemal complex during meiosis
Simone Köhler, Michal Wojcik, Ke Xu, Abby F. Dernburg

 

Vps54 regulates Drosophila neuromuscular junction development and controls postsynaptic density composition via a Rab7-dependent mechanism
Prajal H. Patel, Emily C. Wilkinson, Emily L. Starke, Malea R. McGimsey, J. Todd Blankenship, Scott A. Barbee

 

Transcytosis via the late endocytic pathway as a cell morphogenetic mechanism
Renjith Mathew, Luis Daniel Rios-Barrera, Pedro Machado, Yannick Schwab, Maria Leptin

 

Drosophila cell cycles from Falahati, et al.

 

Temperature-Induced Uncoupling of Cell Cycle Regulators
Hanieh Falahati, Woonyung Hur, Stefano Di Talia, Eric F. Wieschaus

 

Measuring cell trajectories in Heinrich, et al.

 

Tissue size controls patterns of cell proliferation and migration in freely-expanding epithelia
Matthew A Heinrich, Julienne LaChance, Tom J. Zajdel, Ricard Alert, Andrej Kosmrlj, Daniel J. Cohen

 

Vezatin is required for the retrograde axonal transport of endosomes in Drosophila and zebrafish
Michael A. Spinner, Katherine Pinter, Catherine M. Drerup, Tory G. Herman

 

A paralog-specific role of the COPI pathway in the neuronal differentiation of murine pluripotent cells
Manu Goyal, Xiyan Zhao, Mariya Bozhinova, Karla Lisette Andrade López, Cecilia de Heus, Sandra Schulze-Dramac, Michaela Müller-McNicoll, Judith Klumperman, Julien Béthune

 

Lamellipodin tunes cell migration by stabilizing protrusions and promoting adhesion formation
Georgi Dimchev, Behnam Amiri, Ashley C. Humphries, Matthias Schaks, Vanessa Dimchev, Theresia E.B. Stradal, Jan Faix, Matthias Krause, Michael Way, Martin Falcke, Klemens Rottner

 

Microtubule Assembly and Pole Coalescence: Early Steps in C. elegans Oocyte Meiosis I Spindle Assembly
Chien-Hui Chuang, Aleesa J. Schlientz, Jie Yang, Bruce Bowerman

 

Suppression of canonical TGF-β signaling enables GATA4 to interact with H3K27me3 demethylase JMJD3 to promote cardiomyogenesis
Andrew S Riching, Etienne Danis, Yuanbiao Zhao, Yingqiong Cao, COngwu Chi, Rushita Bagchi, Brianna Klein, Hongyan Xu, TATIANA Kutateladze, Timothy McKinsey, Peter Buttrick, Kunhua Song

 

Stress fibers are embedded in a contractile cortical network.
Timothee Vignaud, Calina Copos, Christophe Leterrier, Qingzong Tseng, Laurent Blanchoin, Alex Mogilner, Manuel THERY, Laetitia Kurzawa

 

Integrin Affinity Modulation Critically Regulates Atherogenic Endothelial Activation in vitro and in vivo
Zaki Al-Yafeai, Jonette M. Peretik, Brenna H. Pearson, Umesh Bhattarai, Dongdong Wang, Brian G. Petrich, A. Wayne Orr

 

Changes in subcellular structures and states of Pumilio1 regulate the translation of target Mad2 and Cyclin B1 mRNAs
Natsumi Takei, Yuki Takada, Shohei Kawamura, Atsushi Saitoh, Jenny Bormann, Wai Shan Yuen, John Carroll, Tomoya Kotani

 

Leading-edge VASP clusters assemble at sites containing lamellipodin and exhibit size-dependent instability
Karen W. Cheng, R. Dyche Mullins

 

A non-canonical Hippo pathway regulates spindle disassembly and cytokinesis during meiosis in Saccharomyces cerevisiae
Scott M. Paulissen, Cindy A. Hunt, Christian J. Slubowski, Yao Yu, Dang Truong, Xheni Mucelli, Hung T. Nguyen, Shayla Newman-Toledo, Aaron M. Neiman, Linda S. Huang

 

Slow Axonal Transport and Presynaptic Targeting of Clathrin Packets
Archan Ganguly, Florian Wernert, Sébastien Phan, Daniela Boassa, Utpal Das, Rohan Sharma, Ghislaine Caillol, Xuemei Han, John R. Yates III, Mark H. Ellisman, Christophe Leterrier, Subhojit Roy

 

Ctdnep1 and Eps8L2 regulate dorsal actin cables for nuclear positioning during cell migration
Francisco J. Calero-Cuenca, Daniel S. Osorio, Sreerama Chaitanya Sridhara, Yue Jiao, Jheimmy Diaz, Sofia Carvalho-Marques, Bruno Cadot, Edgar R. Gomes

 

Modelling

 

Drosophila salivary gland from Gomez-Galvez, et al.

 

A quantitative principle to understand 3D cellular connectivity in epithelial tubes
Pedro Gomez-Galvez, Pablo Vicente-Munuera, Samira Anbari, Antonio Tagua, Carmen Gordillo, Ana Maria Palacios, Antonio Velasco, Carlos Capitan-Agudo, Clara Grima, Valentina Annese, Rafael Robles, Alberto Marquez, Javier Buceta, Luis M. Escudero

 

Control of tissue development by cell cycle dependent transcriptional filtering
Maria Abou Chakra, Ruth Isserlin, Thinh Tran, Gary D. Bader

 

On the preservation of vessel bifurcations during flow-mediated angiogenic remodelling
Lowell T. Edgar, Claudio A. Franco, Holger Gerhardt, Miguel O. Bernabeu

 

Evolution of multicellularity by collective integration of spatial information
Enrico Sandro Colizzi, Renske M.A. Vroomans, Roeland M.H. Merks

 

DNA Torsion-based Model of Cell Fate Phase Transitions
Ng Shyh-Chang, Liaofu Luo

 

Stem cell lineage survival as a noisy competition for niche access
Bernat Corominas-Murtra, Colinda L.G.J. Scheele, Kasumi Kishi, Saskia I.J. Ellenbroek, Benjamin D. Simons, Jacco van Rheenen, Edouard Hannezo

 

Shape changes and elastic dewetting of adherent epithelia
Benjamin Loewe, Francesco Serafin, Suraj Shankar, Mark J. Bowick, M. Cristina Marchetti

 

Controlled neighbor exchanges drive glassy behavior, intermittency and cell streaming in epithelial tissues
Amit Das, Srikanth Sastry, Dapeng Bi

 

Identifying density-dependent interactions in collective cell behaviour
Alexander P Browning, Wang Jin, Michael J Plank, Matthew J Simpson

 

Tools & resources

Cell segmentation from Hartmann, et al.

An Image-Based Data-Driven Analysis of Cellular Architecture in a Developing Tissue
Jonas Hartmann, Mie Wong, Elisa Gallo, Darren Gilmour

 

Capybara: A computational tool to measure cell identity and fate transitions
Wenjun Kong, Yuheng C. Fu, Samantha A. Morris

 

ZipSeq : Barcoding for Real-time Mapping of Single Cell Transcriptomes
Kenneth H. Hu, John P. Eichorst, Chris S. McGinnis, David M. Patterson, Eric D. Chow, Kelly Kersten, Stephen C. Jameson, Zev J. Gartner, Arjun A. Rao, Matthew F. Krummel

 

Simultaneous Profiling of DNA Copy Number Variations and Transcriptional Programs in Single Cells using RNA-seq
Ali Madipour-Shirayeh, Natalie Erdmann, Chungyee Leung-Hagesteijn, Paola Neri, Ines Tagoug, Rodger E. Tiedemann

 

Next-generation cytosine base editors with minimized unguided DNA and RNA off-target events and high on-target activity
Yi Yu, Thomas Leete, David A Born, Lauren Young, Luis A Barrera, Seung-Joo Lee, Holly A Rees, Giuseppe Ciaramella, Nicole M Gaudelli

 

Multiplexed conditional genome editing with Cas12a in Drosophila
Fillip Port, Maja Starostecka, Michael Boutros

 

CRISPR-Cas12a-assisted PCR tagging of mammalian genes
Julia Fueller, Konrad Herbst, Matthias Meurer, Krisztina Gubicza, Bahtiyar Kurtulmus, Julia D. Knopf, Daniel Kirrmaier, Benjamin Buchmuller, Gislene Pereira, Marius K. Lemberg, Michael Knop

 

Amplification-free long read sequencing reveals unforeseen CRISPR-Cas9 off-target activity
Ida Höijer, Josefin Johansson, Sanna Gudmundsson, Chen-Shan Chin, Ignas Bunikis, Susana Häggqvist, Anastasia Emmanouilidou, Maria Wilbe, Marcel den Hoed, Marie-Louise Bondeson, Lars Feuk, Ulf Gyllensten, Adam Ameur

 

Instant FLIM enables 4D in vivo lifetime imaging of intact brains
Yide Zhang, Ian H. Guldner, Evan L. Nichols, David Benirschke, Cody J. Smith, Siyuan Zhang, Scott S. Howard

 

Customizable Live-Cell Imaging Chambers for Fluorescence and Super-Resolution Microscopy.
Adam L Tepperman, David Jiao Zheng, Maria Abou Taka, Angela Vrieze, Bryan Heit

 

Ultrastructural Visualization of 3D Chromatin Folding Using Serial Block-Face Scanning Electron Microscopy and In Situ Hybridization (3D-EMISH)
Paweł Trzaskoma, Błażej Ruszczycki, Byoungkoo Lee, Katarzyna K. Pels, Katarzyna Krawczyk, Grzegorz Bokota, Andrzej A. Szczepankiewicz, Jesse Aaron, Agnieszka Walczak, Małgorzata A. Śliwińska, Adriana Magalska, Michal Kadlof, Artur Wolny, Zofia Parteka, Sebastian Arabasz, Magdalena Kiss-Arabasz, Dariusz Plewczynski, Yijun Ruan, Grzegorz M. Wilczyński

 

Structure of the Lifeact–F-actin complex
Alexander Belyy, Felipe Merino, Oleg Sitsel, Stefan Raunser

 

A GT-seq panel for walleye (Sander vitreus) provides a generalized workflow for efficient development and implementation of amplicon panels in non-model organisms
Matthew L. Bootsma, Kristen M. Gruenthal, Garrett J. McKinney, Levi Simmons, Loren Miller, Greg G. Sass, Wesley A. Larson

 

SimpylCellCounter: An Automated Solution for Quantifying Cells in Brain Tissue
Aneesh Bal, Fidel Maureira, Amy A. Arguello

 

Adult mouse retina explants: an ex vivo window to explore central nervous system diseases
Julia Schaeffer, Celine Tardy, Floriane Albert, Stephane Belin, Homaira Nawabi

 

In Vivo Analysis of RNA Proximity Proteomes Using RiboPro
Xianzhi Lin, Kate Lawrenson

 

Fluorophore-labelled RNA aptamers to common protein tags as super-resolution imaging reagents
Juan Wang, Avtar Singh, Abdullah Ozer, Warren R. Zipfel

 

 

Research practice & education

Rethinking success, integrity, and culture in research (part 1) — A multi-actor qualitative study on success in science
Noemie Aubert Bonn, Wim Pinxten

 

Rethinking success, integrity, and culture in research (Part 2) — A multi-actor qualitative study on problems of science
Noemie Aubert Bonn, Wim Pinxten

 

A retrospective analysis of gender parity in scientific authorship in a biomedical research centre
Rinita Dam, Syed Ghulam Sarwar Shah, Maria Julia Milano, Laurel D Edmunds, Lorna R Henderson, Catherine R Hartley, Owen Coxall, Pavel V Ovseiko, Alastair M Buchan, Vasiliki Kiparoglou

 

The Ph.D. Panic: Examining the relationships among teaching anxiety, teaching self-efficacy, and coping in Biology graduate teaching assistants (GTAs)
Miranda M. Chen Musgrove, Elisabeth E. Schussler

 

Supervising the PhD: identifying common mismatches in expectations between candidate and supervisor to improve research training outcomes
Adam P.A. Cardilini, Alice Risely, Mark F. Richardson

 

Disadvantages of writing, reading, publishing and presenting scientific papers caused by the dominance of the English language in science: The case of Colombian Ph.D. in biological sciences
Valeria Ramirez-Castaneda

 

Survey of Australian STEMM Early Career Researchers: job insecurity and questionable research practices are major structural concerns
Katherine Christian, Carolyn Johnstone, Jo-ann Larkins, Wendy Wright, Michael R Doran

 

Study of the Influence of Preprint in bioRχiv for Peer Review and Acceptance Time of PLOS ONE
Hiroyuki Tsunoda, Yuan Sun, Masaki Nishizawa, Xiaomin Liu, Kou Amano

 

Development and validation of the Irish Science Self-Efficacy Children’s Questionnaire to assess the short-term influence of scientists facilitating outreach
Sarah Carroll, Jerome Sheahan, Veronica McCauley, Muriel Grenon

 

Methods for Running a Successful Women-in-STEM Organization on an Academic Campus
Deborah D. Rupert, Alexandra C. Nowlan, Oliver H. Tam, Molly Gale Hammell

 

| Why not…

Genetic Adaptation in New York City Rats

Arbel Harpak, Nandita Garud, Noah A. Rosenberg, Dmitri A. Petrov, Matthew Combs, Pleuni S. Pennings, Jason Munshi-South

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Postdoctoral researchers Solana lab

Posted by , on 2 March 2020

Closing Date: 15 March 2021

Single-cell analysis of planarian stem cell differentiation and regeneration

 

The Solana lab seeks to recruit two postdocs (an experimental and a computational researcher) to develop projects on single-cell analysis of planarian stem cell differentiation. These positions are funded by the Leverhulme Trust.

Single-cell sequencing methods are revolutionising the study of stem cells. The flatworm Schmidtea mediterranea is a very promising model for in vivo stem cell biology. They can regenerate thanks to stem cells that continuously differentiate to all adult cell types. We have previously used single-cell transcriptomics to study stem cell differentiation in planarians. Combining clustering algorithms with graph mathematics and RNA metabolism information we were able to reconstruct the differentiation lineage tree of planarian stem cells. We are now using SPLIT-seq to analyse tens of thousands of single cell transcriptomes under different conditions.

The successful applicants will have:

a: experimental) a PhD or equivalent experience in biology, with experience in cell biology and molecular biology, and familiarity with RNA transcriptomics and/or genomic approaches

b: computational) a PhD or equivalent experience in genomic or transcriptomic analysis and must have good computational skills, including experience in R and Unix.

Additionally, the applicants must have organisational and time management skills, and ability to work independently.

You would join an international and growing group of researchers. We are located at Oxford Brookes University. Currently there are two PhD students, one experimental postdoc, two computational postdocs and one technician. There are opportunities to collaborate with other researchers in the UK, Spain, Germany and Italy. The positions are fully funded but the successful applicants will be encouraged to apply for their own funding.

To apply to either the experimental or computational positions, please use the Oxford Brookes University online system following the links. The deadline is March 29th.

For informal enquiries please contact Dr Jordi Solana (jsolana@brookes.ac.uk)

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Ph.D. Studentship: Cytoskeletal Regulation of Epidermal Stem Cells

Posted by , on 1 March 2020

Closing Date: 15 March 2021

The group of Chen Luxenburg at the Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, invites applications for a Ph.D. student position.

Our laboratory is looking for excellent and highly motivated Ph.D. students to study the role of the actin cytoskeleton in skin development. Our goal is to understand how cytoskeleton derived signals regulate stem cell ability to create the skin epidermis during development, maintain it in the adult, and repair it upon wounding. On top of molecular biology, tissue culture, advanced microscopy, and mouse work, we utilize state of the art technology that allows us to rapidly manipulate the function of any gene of interest in epidermal stem cells in utero. Several exciting projects are available for successful candidates.

We offer state of the art laboratory with a dynamic and international atmosphere and full financial support (tuition and stipend)

Candidates should hold a Master’s degree in Biology/Life-sciences or related fields.

For further information about our lab: www.luxenburglab.com

For further information about Tel Aviv University: https://international.tau.ac.il

Interested candidates should email their CV and a brief paragraph describing their research experience and career plans to Chen Luxenburg (lux@tauex.tau.ac.il)

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Genetics Unzipped – Poop, pus and the Manhattan Project: how we learned to spell the genetic alphabet

Posted by , on 27 February 2020

DNA sequenceThe four letters of life – A, C, T and G – are ingrained into the scientific lexicon and burned into the brain of anyone who’s ever worked with or even just learned about genes, genomes and DNA. It’s a code that’s as inseparable from genetics as the double helix itself.
It might therefore be surprising to learn that scientists knew that DNA was made up of these four iconic chemicals – adenine, cytosine, thymine and guanine – long before its double helical structure was figured out in the 1950s.
So when were they discovered? And how did they get their unforgettable names? To find out, we need to go back to the bird poop boom of the 1840s.

Go to GeneticsUnzipped.com to listen or download and to get a full transcript, links and references.

Genetics Unzipped is the podcast from The Genetics Society.Subscribe from Apple podcasts/iTunes, Spotify and all good podcast apps to make sure you get the latest episodes and catch up on our back catalogue.

If you enjoy the show, please do rate and review on Apple podcasts and help to spread the word on social media. And you can always send feedback and suggestions for future episodes and guests to podcast@geneticsunzipped.com Follow us on Twitter – @geneticsunzip

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Moving neuromuscular disorders research forward: from novel models to clinical studies

Posted by , on 27 February 2020

This Editorial by Maaike van Putten, Julija Hmeljak, Annemieke Aartsma-Rus and James J. Dowling was recently published in Development’s sister journal Disease Models & Mechanisms, announcing a new Special Issue.


Neuromuscular disorders (NMDs) encompass a diverse group of genetic diseases characterized by loss of muscle functionality. Despite extensive efforts to develop therapies, no curative treatment exists for any of the NMDs. For multiple disorders, however, therapeutic strategies are currently being tested in clinical settings, and the first successful treatments have now entered clinical practice (e.g. spinraza for spinal muscular atrophy). Successful clinical translation depends on the quality and translatability of preclinical findings and on the predictive value of the experimental models used in their initial development. This Special Issue of Disease Models & Mechanisms has a particular focus on translational research for NMDs. The collection includes original research focusing on advances in the development of novel in vitro and in vivo models, broader understanding of disease pathology and progression, and approaches to modify the disease course in these models. We also present a series of special articles and reviews that highlight our understanding of cellular mechanisms, biomarkers to tract disease pathology, the diversity of mouse models for NMDs, the importance of high-quality preclinical studies and data validation, and the pitfalls of successfully moving a potential therapeutic strategy to the clinic.In this Editorial, we summarize the highlights of these articles and place their findings in the broader context of the NMD research field.

Introduction

Neuromuscular diseases (NMDs) are a broad and heterogeneous collection of disorders that involve dysfunctionality of the peripheral nerves and/or muscles. For the majority of these disorders, the genetic defect has been known for decades and a vast amount of knowledge on their aetiology, epidemiology and pathophysiology is available (Emery, 2002; Mercuri and Muntoni, 2013). Although these disorders were considered untreatable for a long time, several therapeutic approaches have advanced to clinical trials in the past few years, and some have proven effective (reviewed in Dowling et al., 2017). Unfortunately, the number of NMDs for which treatment is either commercially available or available off label is very limited. The lack of treatment options is mainly due to the rarity and heterogeneity of the disorders, their often-complicated genetics, the high abundance of muscle tissue to be targeted and treated, and low treatment efficacy. With limited numbers of patients available for clinical trials due to disease rarity, compound prioritization and success rates of clinical trials likely depend on the quality and reliability of preclinical studies (Kornegay et al., 2014).

The predictive value of preclinical studies is determined by the availability of cell and animal models that can accurately recapitulate disease aspects. Initial compound selection requires cell models with corresponding genetic defects. Currently, tools such as induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and gene-editing technologies such as clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)/Cas9 have respectively enabled the rapid production of suitable cell and animal models (Gurumurthy and Lloyd, 2019). The generation of humanized animal models, which recapitulate aspects of the disease pathology and progression and carry the human-specific causative genetic lesion, has become easier in the past decade. Increased attention to the need for insights in natural disease history, standardization of functional outcome measures, validation of results and discovery of biomarkers has moved the field forward. Committees like the TREAT-NMD Advisory Committee for Therapeutics (TACT) have been put in place to critically evaluate preclinical data before a potential drug is further tested in clinical settings (Heslop et al., 2015; Wagner et al., 2020). This Special Issue of Disease Models & Mechanisms (DMM) focuses on all these important aspects of translational research.

 

Conversations

To many researchers in the NMD field, science is personal. Therefore, we open this issue with exclusive ‘A Model for Life’ interviews with Elizabeth McNally and Louis Kunkel, two pioneers in the field who have dedicated their careers to improving our understanding of NMD biology and translating it into clinically viable interventions. Elizabeth talks about the important role of targetable genetic modifiers and about her passion for team sports (McNally, 2019), whereas Louis discusses the excitement of mapping the dystrophin gene and his family’s genetics approach to gardening (Kunkel, 2019).

We also present a series of ‘First Person’ interviews with the early-career researchers who were the first authors of research articles in this special issue. In these, a new generation of scientists tells us the stories behind their papers, the key challenges of NMD research and their future career plans.

Special articles: how to not get lost in translation
This issue features two ‘Special Articles’ that, from vastly different perspectives, highlight the steps necessary to successfully translate fundamental insights into viable clinical approaches. The first, by Belinda Cowling and Leen Thielemans (Cowling and Thielemans, 2019), provides a roadmap and valuable personal experience for researchers planning on transitioning their careers to the industry.

Next, guest editors Annemieke Aartsma-Rus and Maaike van Putten discuss the unique advantages and challenges of developing humanized mouse models for neuromuscular disease. In a field in which defined genetic causes are the backbone and foundation of disease understanding and pathogenesis, and mutation-specific forms of therapies hold great therapeutic potential, mouse models that carry the human sequence and recapitulate the key features of human disease represent a viable testing platform (Aartsma-Rus and van Putten, 2019).

 

Reviews: state of the art

A new ‘At a Glance’ article presents the cellular mechanisms that govern the growth and regeneration of skeletal muscle, and highlights the defects in satellite cell function that give rise to muscular dystrophies (Morgan and Partridge, 2020). The accompanying poster, which is available in high resolution (http://dmm.biologists.org/content/13/2/dmm042192/F1.poster.jpg), visualizes the processes discussed in the article.

Improved understanding of the biological processes governing muscle development and regeneration can point to both therapeutic windows and valuable biomarkers for tracking disease progression and response to treatment. Although researchers can use various model systems to address these questions, the mouse remains the most popular model animal. van Putten and colleagues have collated a comprehensive table summarizing mouse models of various muscular dystrophies (van Putten et al., 2020), which will undoubtedly help researchers select the most appropriate mouse strain for their study. Providing an excellent example of how choosing the appropriate model system can accelerate discovery, a Review by Miranda Grounds’ group discusses the biomarkers that can track myonecrosis, oxidative stress and inflammation in experimental systems of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) and in patients (Grounds et al., 2020).

Concluding this section, members of the TREAT-NMD Advisory Committee for Therapeutics review their own experiences in providing detailed feedback on clinical proposals for neuromuscular diseases submitted by researchers in both academia and industry (Willman et al., 2020). Because most individual neuromuscular disorders are rare, the patient pools are limited. This, combined with the complex aetiology and heterogeneous genetics of these disorders, emphasizes that a timely critical review of preclinical work can significantly help to de-risk translation and improve prospects for patients. The article also offers recommendations for planning preclinical studies based on ‘lessons learned’ from past experiences.

 

New research: of cells, mice and much more

This Special Issue contains a large collection of research papers that utilized cell and/or animal models to study pathological features of NMDs. Two papers described novel patient-derived cell models for X-linked disorders. Perez-Siles et al. generated an iPSC line from an X-linked distal hereditary motor neuropathy (dHMNX) patient carrying a mutation in the copper transporter ATP7A (Perez-Siles et al., 2020). The derived motor neurons had reduced ATP7A levels leading to alterations in mitochondrial features. This model provides the field with a tool to further study the pathological process leading to axonal degeneration in dHMNX. Fernandes et al. derived immortalized myoblasts from an X-linked myopathy patient with a small indel mutation in the VMA21 gene (Fernandes et al., 2020). They studied how autophagy is regulated during myogenesis in this disorder and observed uncontrolled myoblast fusion, which might explain why muscles are the predominantly involved tissue in this disorder. Patient-derived cell models provide ample opportunities to study very rare disorders in a cost-effective manner and allow a first screening for therapeutic strategies.

The availability of animal models that (at least partly) recapitulate the genetic and pathological hallmarks found in NMD patients is of great importance for the execution of more in-depth preclinical research. They not only allow for pharmacokinetic, pharmacodynamic and safety studies, but also enable assessments of a therapeutic compound’s effects on muscle quality and functionality. This Special Issue contains two articles describing novel mouse models. Demonbreun et al. utilized CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing to generate a mouse model for limb-girdle muscular dystrophy type 2C (Demonbreun et al., 2019). This 521ΔT mouse carries the most frequent reading-frame-disrupting mutation found in patients: a single-nucleotide deletion in exon 6 of the SGCG gene. Mice consequently suffer from a severe muscular dystrophy. The authors show, for the first time, that the disrupted reading frame of the Sgcg gene could be restored with antisense oligonucleotide exon skipping, leading to production of internally truncated but functional γ-sarcoglycan protein upon local administration. Cordero-Sanchez et al. generated a knock-in mouse model (KI-STIMI115F) that carries a clinically relevant mutation in one of the two calcium-sensing EF-hand motifs of STIM1 (Cordero-Sanchez et al., 2019). Gain-of-function mutations in STIM1 underlie very rare disorders characterized by loss of muscle tissue and platelet dysfunctionality. The authors showed that the heterozygous mice described in the paper suffer from muscle pathology and thrombocytopenia, and as such can be used to further study these pathological features.

To allow successful preclinical development of therapeutic strategies, it is important to have access to extensive data on the natural disease progression of animal models, a broader understanding of the disease pathology, and robust outcome measures that can be used to assess treatment efficacy. Zdenka Ellederová’s group neatly characterized pathology of the brain and nerves of a minipig model for Huntington’s disease (Ardan et al., 2020; Baxa et al., 2020). Their in-depth studies on several disease aspects, which were conducted at several stages throughout the animal model’s life, will be of great benefit for those working with this minipig and other large animal models of Huntington’s disease and facilitate the design of future intervention studies.

Although the skeletal muscle system is most dramatically affected in most NMDs, some affect multiple organs. Additionally, environmental or intrinsic factors, like altered gene expression profiles, are hypothesized to influence pathology. In DMD patients, the causative mutation results in a lack of brain-specific dystrophin isoforms, which leads to behavioural and cognitive deficits. Stay et al. neatly investigated the cerebellar circuit in the mdx mouse model of DMD and showed that the absence of full-length dystrophin alters the firing rate and pattern of Purkinje cells (Stay et al., 2019). Figueroa-Romero et al. reported that young SOD1G93A mice, a model for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), experience alterations in their microbiome and expansion and activation of immune cells prior to developing motor function deficits (Figueroa-Romero et al., 2019). O’Brien et al. showed that diet and metabolism can affect motor neuron health: in high-fat diet fed mice, an abnormal nerve-lipid signalling underlies the peripheral neuropathy seen in prediabetic and type 2 diabetic patients (O’Brien et al., 2020). Further investigations of these early alterations could help identify biomarkers and/or therapeutic interventions, and highlight the need for interdisciplinary approaches when uncovering the biology and therapeutic windows of NMDs.

The guest editors of this Special Issue have selected two Editors’ choice articles. The first pick is from Chagovetz et al. The authors elegantly dissected the function of different ryanodine receptors (RyRs) during zebrafish development, and thereby increased our understanding of the interplay between different RyR isoforms and of the pathological mechanisms underlying the heterogeneous set of phenotypes in patients with RYR1 mutations (Chagovetz et al., 2019). The second Editors’ choice article studied growth and skeletal development in several mouse models of DMD. The Editors have highlighted this article because the authors report that the mdx:Cmah−/− mouse model for DMD is not suitable to study certain aspects of DMD pathology (Wood et al., 2020). Unfortunately, a tendency exists amongst researchers to prioritize publishing data that confirm suitability of a particular model system or reveal a beneficial effect of a drug. However, understanding whether model systems cannot be used to address a particular research question, or whether a drug target is not as promising as hypothesized, is just as crucial. As such, these negative findings are very important to move the field forward and we applaud the authors for doing so.

 

From DMM’s archive

Aside from the excellent research published in this Special Issue, DMM has long had the privilege of featuring a number of excellent research and review-type articles in the field of neuromuscular disorders. Here, we highlight the most-read ones, and apologize to the authors of the articles we couldn’t feature due to space restraints.

A standout article from 2018 described a novel CRISPR/Cas9-generated rabbit model of DMD by Renzi Han’s group (Sui et al., 2018). Dominic Wells wrote an editorial highlighting how this new model complements existing animal models of this devastating neuromuscular disorder (Wells, 2018). CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing was also the tool of choice for Egorova et al., who used it to generate a mouse model of a newly identified DMD mutation in a Russian patient (Egorova et al., 2019).

As discussed above, iPSC-derived models are increasingly valuable resources in rare disease research, as also shown in the 2019 article by the Suzuki group, who investigated the role of the C9ORF72 expansion in skeletal myocytes differentiated from ALS patient iPSCs (Lynch et al., 2019).

We also published a number of comprehensive reviews. Examples include articles on the various mouse models of ALS (De Giorgio et al., 2019), on the roles of dystroglycans (Nickolls and Bönnemann, 2018) and collagen VI (Gregorio et al., 2018) in the nervous and muscular systems, and on the most recent insights from core myopathy model systems (Fusto et al., 2019).

This Special Issue also launches an ongoing subject collection (https://dmm.biologists.org/collection/neuromuscular), in which we will continue to collate exciting review, research and resource articles. We hope you enjoy reading these freely accessible articles.

 

Conclusions

The Special Issue nicely highlights the amazing advances in the neuromuscular field in recent years related to pathomechanistic understanding and therapy development. There is an increasing amount of novel cell and animal models available, even for some of the rarest NMDs, which will allow for further characterization of the disease pathology and hopefully facilitate the development of novel therapeutic strategies. It has become clear that insights into the natural history of the individual NMDs, standardization of outcome measures and validation of research findings are of utmost importance to de-risk translation of therapeutic efficacy from model systems to patients. This change in perspective could move the NMD field forward and might result in better selection of candidate compounds and eventually a higher success rate in clinical trials for these devastating disorders.

This article is part of a special collection ‘A Guide to Using Neuromuscular Disease Models for Basic and Preclinical Studies’, which was launched in a dedicated issue guest edited by Annemieke Aartsma-Rus, Maaike van Putten and James Dowling. See related articles in this collection at http://dmm.biologists.org/collection/neuromuscular.

 

Acknowledgements

We thank DMM’s authors, reviewers and editors who helped to compile this special issue and ongoing subject collection. Particular thanks to Monica Justice and Steven Clapcote for handling many of the research articles published in this issue.

 

References

Aartsma-Rus, A. and van Putten, M. (2019). The use of genetically humanized animal models for personalized medicine approaches. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm041673. doi:10.1242/dmm.041673

Ardan, T., Baxa, M., Levinská, B., Sedláčková, M., Nguyen, T. D., Klíma, J., Juhás, Š., Juhásová, J., Šmatlíková, P., Vochozková, P. et al. (2020). Transgenic minipig model of Huntington’s disease exhibiting gradually progressing neurodegeneration. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm041319. doi:10.1242/dmm.041319

Baxa, M., Levinska, B., Skrivankova, M., Pokorny, M., Juhasova, J., Klima, J., Klempir, J., Motlík, J., Juhas, S. and Ellederova, Z. (2020). Longitudinal study revealing motor, cognitive and behavioral decline in a transgenic minipig model of Huntington’s disease. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm041293. doi:10.1242/dmm.041293

Chagovetz, A. A., Klatt Shaw, D., Ritchie, E., Hoshijima, K. and Grunwald, D. J. (2019). Interactions among ryanodine receptor isotypes contribute to muscle fiber type development and function. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm038844. doi:10.1242/dmm.038844

Cordero-Sanchez, C., Riva, B., Reano, S., Clemente, N., Zaggia, I., Ruffinatti, F. A., Potenzieri, A., Pirali, T., Raffa, S., Sangaletti, S. et al. (2019). A luminal EF-hand mutation in STIM1 in mice causes the clinical hallmarks of tubular aggregate myopathy. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm041111. doi:10.1242/dmm.041111

Cowling, B. S. and Thielemans, L. (2019). Translational medicine in neuromuscular disorders: from academia to industry. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm041434. doi:10.1242/dmm.041434

De Giorgio, F., Maduro, C., Fisher, E. M. C. and Acevedo-Arozena, A. (2019). Transgenic and physiological mouse models give insights into different aspects of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Dis. Model. Mech. 12, dmm037424. doi:10.1242/dmm.037424

Demonbreun, A. R., Wyatt, E. J., Fallon, K. S., Oosterbaan, C. C., Page, P., Hadhazy, M., Quattrocelli, M., Barefield, D. Y. and McNally, E. M. (2019). A gene-edited mouse model of Limb-Girdle muscular dystrophy 2C for testing exon skipping. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm.040832. doi:10.1242/dmm.040832

Dowling, J. J., D Gonorazky, H., Cohn, R. D. and Campbell, C. (2017). Treating pediatric neuromuscular disorders: The future is now. Am. J. Med. Genet. A 176, 804-841. doi:10.1002/ajmg.a.38418

Egorova, T. V., Zotova, E. D., Reshetov, D. A., Polikarpova, A. V., Vassilieva, S. G., Vlodavets, D. V., Gavrilov, A. A., Ulianov, S. V., Buchman, V. L. and Deykin, A. V. (2019). CRISPR/Cas9-generated mouse model of Duchenne muscular dystrophy recapitulating a newly identified large 430 kb deletion in the human DMD gene. Dis. Model. Mech. 12, dmm037655. doi:10.1242/dmm.037655

Emery, A. E. (2002). The muscular dystrophies. Lancet 359, 687-695. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(02)07815-7

Fernandes, S. A., Almeida, C. F., Souza, L. S., Lazar, M., Onofre-Oliveira, P., Yamamoto, G. L., Nogueira, L., Tasaki, L. Y., Cardoso, R. R., Pavanello, R. C. M. et al. (2020). Altered in vitro muscle differentiation in X-linked myopathy with excessive autophagy. Dis. Model. Mech. 13. doi:10.1242/dmm.041244

Figueroa-Romero, C., Guo, K., Murdock, B. J., Paez-Colasante, X., Bassis, C. M., Mikhail, K. A., Raue, K. D., Evans, M. C., Taubman, G. F., McDermott, A. J. et al. (2019). Temporal evolution of the microbiome, immune system, and epigenome with disease progression in ALS mice. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm.041947. doi:10.1242/dmm.041947

Fusto, A., Moyle, L. A., Gilbert, P. M. and Pegoraro, E. (2019). Cored in the act: the use of models to understand core myopathies. Dis. Model. Mech. 12, dmm041368. doi:10.1242/dmm.041368

Gregorio, I., Braghetta, P., Bonaldo, P. and Cescon, M. (2018). Collagen VI in healthy and diseased nervous system. Dis. Model. Mech. 11, dmm032946. doi:10.1242/dmm.032946

Grounds, M. D., Terrill, J. R., Al-Mshhdani, B. A., Duong, M. N., Radley-Crabb, H. G. and Arthur, P. G. (2020). Biomarkers for Duchenne muscular dystrophy: myonecrosis, inflammation and oxidative stress. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm043638. doi:10.1242/dmm.043638

Gurumurthy, C. B. and Lloyd, K. C. K. (2019). Generating mouse models for biomedical research: technological advances. Dis. Model. Mech. 12, dmm029462. doi:10.1242/dmm.029462

Heslop, E., Csimma, C., Straub, V., McCall, J., Nagaraju, K., Wagner, K. R., Caizergues, D., Korinthenberg, R., Flanigan, K. M., Kaufmann, P. et al. (2015). The TREAT-NMD advisory committee for therapeutics (TACT): an innovative de-risking model to foster orphan drug development. Orphanet. J. Rare. Dis. 10, 49. doi:10.1186/s13023-015-0258-1

Kornegay, J. N., Spurney, C. F., Nghiem, P. P., Brinkmeyer-Langford, C. L., Hoffman, E. P. and Nagaraju, K. (2014). Pharmacologic management of duchenne muscular dystrophy: target identification and preclinical trials. ILAR J. 55, 119-149. doi:10.1093/ilar/ilu011

Kunkel, L. M. (2019). To dystrophin and beyond: an interview with Louis Kunkel. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm043018. doi:10.1242/dmm.043018

Lynch, E., Semrad, T., Belsito, V. S., FitzGibbons, C., Reilly, M., Hayakawa, K. and Suzuki, M. (2019). C9ORF72-related cellular pathology in skeletal myocytes derived from ALS-patient induced pluripotent stem cells. Dis. Model. Mech. 12, dmm039552. doi:10.1242/dmm.039552

McNally, E. (2019). At the heart of genetic disease: an interview with Elizabeth McNally. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm041566. doi:10.1242/dmm.041566

Mercuri, E. and Muntoni, F. (2013). Muscular dystrophy: new challenges and review of the current clinical trials. Curr. Opin. Pediatr 25, 701-707. doi:10.1097/MOP.0b013e328365ace5

Morgan, J. and Partridge, T. (2020). Skeletal muscle in health and disease. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm042192. doi:10.1242/dmm.042192

Nickolls, A. R. and Bönnemann, C. G. (2018). The roles of dystroglycan in the nervous system: insights from animal models of muscular dystrophy. Dis. Model. Mech. 11, dmm035931. doi:10.1242/dmm.035931

O’Brien, P. D., Guo, K., Eid, S. A., Rumora, A. E., Hinder, L. M., Hayes, J. M., Mendelson, F. E., Hur, J. and Feldman, E. L. (2020). Integrated lipidomic and transcriptomic analyses identify altered nerve triglycerides in mouse models of prediabetes and type 2 diabetes. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm042101. doi:10.1242/dmm.042101

Perez-Siles, G., Cutrupi, A., Ellis, M., Kuriakose, J., La Fontaine, S., Mao, D., Uesugi, M., Takata, R. I., Speck-Martins, C. E., Nicholson, G. et al. (2020). Modelling the pathogenesis of X-linked distal hereditary motor neuropathy using patient-derived iPSCs. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm041541. doi:10.1242/dmm.041541

Stay, T. L., Miterko, L. N., Arancillo, M., Lin, T. and Sillitoe, R. V. (2019). In vivo cerebellar circuit function is disrupted in an mdx mouse model of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm040840. doi:10.1242/dmm.040840

Sui, T., Lau, Y. S., Liu, D., Liu, T., Xu, L., Gao, Y., Lai, L., Li, Z. and Han, R. (2018). A novel rabbit model of Duchenne muscular dystrophy generated by CRISPR/Cas9. Dis. Model. Mech. 11, dmm032201. doi:10.1242/dmm.032201

van Putten, M., Lloyd, E. M., de Greef, J. C., Raz, V., Willmann, R. and Grounds, M. D. (2020). Mouse models for muscular dystrophies: an overview. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm 043562. doi:10.1242/dmm.043562

Wagner, K. R., De Luca, A., Caizergues, D., Dowling, J., Goemans, N., Gordish-Dressman, H., Grounds, M. D., Kelly, M., Mayhew, A., McNally, E. M. et al. (2020). A decade of optimizing drug development for rare neuromuscular disorders through TACT. Nat. Rev. Drug Discov. 19, 1-2. doi:10.1038/d41573-019-00199-1

Wells, D. J. (2018). Tracking progress: an update on animal models for Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Dis. Model. Mech. 11. doi:10.1242/dmm.035774

Willmann, R., Lee, J., Turner, C., Nagaraju, K., Aartsma-Rus, A., Wells, D. J., Wagner, K. R., Csimma, C., Straub, V., Grounds, M. D. and De Luca, A. (2020). Improving translatability of preclinical studies for neuromuscular disorders: lessons from the TREAT-NMD Advisory Committee for Therapeutics (TACT). Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm 042903. doi:10.1242/dmm.042903

Wood, C. L., Suchaki, K. J., van ‘t Hof, R., Cawthorn, W. P., Dillon, S., Straub, V., Wong, S. C., Ahmed, S. F. and Farquharson, C. (2020). A comparison of the bone and growth phenotype of mdx, mdx:Cmah−/− and mdx:Utrn+/− murine models with the C57BL/10 wild-type mouse. Dis. Model. Mech. 13, dmm040659. doi:10.1242/dmm.040659

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POSTDOCTORAL RESEARCHER

Posted by , on 27 February 2020

Closing Date: 15 March 2021

Kuure lab, affiliated with STEMM research program at Research Programs Unit of the Faculty of Medicine and Helsinki Institute of Life Science (HiLIFE), University of Helsinki, invites applications for a position of

POSTDOCTORAL RESEARCHER IN FinnDisMice PROJECT

for a two-year fixed term position (possibility for extension) starting as soon as possible. Trial period of six months will be applied.

The position is open in a national research consortium focusing on modeling Finnish disease heritage in mouse. These monogenic diseases are typically rare, but highly enriched in Finland. With CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing we aim at mimicking two rare human fetal syndromes, LCCS1 and LCHAD, and an adult-onset motoneuron disease, the Jokela type of spinal muscular atrophy, in animal models.

Requirements

The successful applicant should have PhD degree and be well acquainted with molecular biology, genome engineering, and most importantly, show self-motivation and enthusiasm towards science, learning new things and technologies. Previous experience in imaging, developmental and cell biology, and tissue processing techniques are acknowledged.

The salary is based on the Finnish university salary (YPJ) system, which take into account previous qualifications, experience and performance.

To apply, please submit a single pdf application including a short cover letter describing your areas of expertise and motivation for the position, CV (max 2 pages), and names and contact information of two to three references through  by clicking on “Apply for the position“. Current employees of the University of Helsinki are to submit their applications through the SAP HR portal.

Application deadline is March 29, 2020

For further information, please contact GM-unit Director Satu Kuure, tel. +358 2941 59395, or by mailing

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2020 Santa Cruz Developmental Biology Meeting

Posted by , on 26 February 2020

From the 2020 SCDB organizing committee (Sally Horne-Badovinac, Sean Megason and Zhu Wang). See also a Node report from the 2018 edition, and an interview with 2018 SCBD Young Investigator Award Winner, Vilaiwan Fernandes.


 

We are pleased to announce the 2020 Santa Cruz Developmental Biology Meeting, which will be held August 8-12 on the beautiful UC Santa Cruz campus. Since 1992, the SCDB meeting has been a premier gathering for developmental biologists from around the world. This year’s meeting is organized around the theme, “Looking to the future: open questions in developmental biology”. Our central goal is to highlight the top challenges facing the field, both conceptual and technical, as we seek fresh insights into the complex mechanisms underlying organismal development, tissue renewal, and the evolution of new forms. The exciting lineup of keynote speakers includes: Philipp Keller, Ruth Lehmann, Roberto Mayor, and Magdalena Zernica-Goetz. There will also be a career-perspective talk from one of the meeting’s founders, Cynthia Kenyon. For the full list of invited speakers, please see the poster.

 

 

The SCDB meeting is designed to foster interaction among developmental biologists at all career stages. A sequence of single-platform sessions will be interspersed with career-focused workshops and poster sessions. In addition to invited speakers, at least 16 short talks will be chosen from the submitted abstracts, with preference given to students, postdocs, and junior faculty. Depending on funds, a limited number of travel awards will be available to trainees with financial need.

 

SCDB Young Investigator Award

If you are a postdoctoral trainee or graduate student, and you would like to be considered for the SCDB Young Investigator Award, we strongly encourage you to submit your CV along with your abstract to scdb2020@gmail.com. The SCDB Young Investigator Awardee will speak in the opening session, receive free registration and housing, a $500 award, and an interview published in Development! This award is sponsored by Development.

Please help us advertise the meeting by printing the attached poster and hanging it in a prominent location, and by forwarding this email to colleagues. If you are a faculty member, please encourage your students and postdocs to submit abstracts and attend the meeting.

This promises to be an exciting meeting and we look forward to seeing you all this summer!

 

http://scdb2020.com/

 

 

 

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Meeting Development, Evolution & Anatomy, FREE, NYU 18 May 2020

Posted by , on 25 February 2020

Come for free, participate in our round table discussions, and honor a great scientist and person. Free and open to anyone interested, with an amazing list of speakers and talks, as none of the most renowned scientists in the field that was invited wanted to miss this unique opportunity to honor the amazing Drew Noden.

list of talks

 

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Message from SDB President Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado

Posted by , on 25 February 2020

The following message by Society for Developmental Biology President, Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado (Stowers Institute for Medical Research), was originally posted on the Society for Developmental Biology website February 24, 2020.

Dear Members and Friends of the Society for Developmental Biology,

Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado
Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado

We are living in interesting times. Technological advances are moving at neck-breaking speed: artificial intelligence, machine learning, neural networks, quantum computers, advances in optical and electron microscopy, machine miniaturization and gene editing… a list that seems to grow geometrically with every passing month. From the look of it, both lay and scientific publications seem to herald the advent of an age of technological wonders in which previously inaccessible biology is now tangibly within our grasps.

And yet, as a species, we are also facing record challenges. For us biologists at large, and developmental biologists in particular, we are witnessing changes to our planet’s biome that are without precedent in human history. We are witnessing rapid decreases in biodiversity in ecosystems around the world, expansion of species into new territories along with the attendant displacement -even extinction- of endemic organisms that usually follows, and the perturbation of natural processes caused by unnatural warming, acidification and microplastics. The current global environmental deterioration should make us pause, not just as individuals, but particularly as developmental biologists, for where would our field be without the many research organisms we brought from nature into our labs?

Yes, these matters may not appear to be of direct concern to developmental biology. I would argue they should be. For most of the 20th century, modern developmental biology has been limited to the study of a handful of organisms in great part due to the absence of technology that prevented us from taking a more systematic and global approach to understanding fundamental aspects of developmental processes. That limitation is no longer as daunting. Why then should we continue to bring nature into our labs when it is becoming more and more practical to bring our laboratory sophistication to nature and study development there instead?

The accomplishments of our field thus far have been numerous. Developmental Biologists uncovered the fundamental underpinnings of gastrulation, pattern formation, tissue polarity, organogenesis, sex determination, epigenetics, aging, apoptosis and cellular reprogramming, among others. It is easy to forget, yet important to remember that it was Developmental Biologists who first isolated and cultured stem cells and cloned animals. Morphogens, the genetic unravelling of the major signaling pathways by which cells communicate with each other, RNA-mediated genetic interference (RNAi), microRNAs, the fundamental principles of differential gene regulation, all of them discovered by Developmental Biologists. Importantly, Developmental Biologists not only have introduced technological advances to the study of life such as in situ hybridization, genome manipulation and in vivo imaging, but our discipline has also created the context in which to understand human birth defects and disease.

Now, take a second and imagine the immensity of what we can contribute in this century to address pressing global problems by merely expanding our interrogation of development into unknown and/or understudied organisms. Organisms with which, by the way, we share profound evolutionary ties. Simply put, we have but barely scratched the surface of development: we do not know what is possible. The sheer number of species out there waiting to show us what is indeed biologically possible is staggering. Nature has done many more experiments than any of us can fathom, each extant species a unique interpretation of evolution. Equally remarkable is the fact that our species has the necessary tools to decode and understand them all if we so wished. In fact, merely expanding our knowledge of developmental processes in as many species as possible would stand to provide unimagined knowledge, which would result in–in the words of Abraham Flexner–“undreamed-of utility”.

There is an essential role discovery researchers play in the well-being of science and society. The vitality, longevity and, therefore, relevance of the biomedical sciences is ultimately and intricately dependent on the combined efforts of present and future scientists who are averse to neither risk-taking, nor effectively communicating their work to the general public. More than ever, we in the Society for Developmental Biology need to bring a strong and contemporary approach to meet the challenges facing our current members, and to actively participate in national discussions that affect our research, education and outreach activities. That is why our annual meeting will include in its program scores of early career investigators and a selected number of topics not traditionally considered to be part of our discipline. At the very least, I am quite certain that we will likely leave our annual meeting with a host of new ideas and perhaps new ways of looking at our own science.

I believe that the time is coming when developmental biology will be needed to inform and contribute to the study, and more importantly, to the solutions of some of the major problems affecting the health of our planet and its biome. I am delighted to serve as our Society’s president and to continue to drive forward the major goals of the SDB: to support talented investigators at all stages of their careers, stimulate the exchange of scientific information, and promote a research environment where developmental biologists can achieve their best work.

I am very much looking forward to seeing all of you in Chicago in 2020.

Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado, Ph.D.
President, Society for Developmental Biology

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Growing a body, one tiny tug at a time

Posted by , on 24 February 2020

From Knowable Magazine’s Special Report: Building Bodies. For an introduction to the series see Eva Emerson and Rosie Mestel’s Node post.


For decades, genetics and biochemistry have formed the bedrock of developmental biology. But it turns out that physical forces — the way cells push, pull and squeeze each other — play a huge role, too.

By David Levin

 

In every parent’s life there comes a singular moment, a knife edge when the world bisects neatly into two parts. There’s life before, and life after. Mine split irreversibly on a frigid December morning, just past 4 a.m., as my son took his first breath and sent me reeling over the threshold of fatherhood, ecstatic and teary-eyed.

Witnessing the birth of my first child opened up whole new avenues of developmental biology for me, as a science writer, to ponder. How could our little miracle, with his wriggling legs, searching gaze, tiny, grasping hands, emerge from a minuscule ball of cells? The basic concept has been drilled into our brains since we were kids: From the union of sperm and egg comes an embryo. But as that egg divides and grows, how does the structure of a body come to be?

It’s a doozy of a question. For more than half a century, the go-to answer has been DNA and biochemistry: Nearly every aspect of development, researchers thought, could be brought on by triggering the right genes at the right times or adding the right chemical signal, creating a cascade of precise transformations. Over the past few decades, though, a growing body of work has cast a spotlight on another starring role in this show. Physical and mechanical forces — things that pull and stretch and twist and squish cells — act alongside genes, and play a major role in everything from the formation of organs to the structure of our limbs to the onset of disease. Serious conditions like certain types of muscular dystrophy and cancer, which seem entirely disparate on the surface, may result from a breakdown of force-sensing mechanisms in cells.

The idea isn’t exactly new. “If you get books on science from the 1890s to the 1910s, everything’s explained mechanically,” says bioengineer and cell biologist Don Ingber, the founding director of Harvard’s Wyss Institute and coauthor of a 2013 overview of the role of mechanics in cell development in the Annual Review of Cell and Developmental Biology. “Then chemistry came in, genetics came in, and the baby was thrown out with the bathwater.”

Armed with technology that can probe and measure forces at a cellular level, more scientists are starting to return to these century-old concepts — and according to Ingber, it’s becoming increasingly clear that physical forces and mechanics are a crucial part of developmental biology.

A key 2006 study in the journal Cell showed just how dramatically force can change cell function. When adult stem cells grew on a soft surface, the paper reported, they started to form something that looked like developing neurons — but when they grew on a hard substrate, they instead took on the shape of osteoblasts, the precursor cells to bone.

“If the cell is round and floppy, or spread out wide and pulled taut, you get totally different functions,” Ingber says. In other words, the forces that a stem cell “feels” on its surface may determine what sort of tissue it will ultimately become.

It’s still not obvious how those minute forces help to shape the formation of all of a body’s requisite parts, however. What signals do they provide that drive the development of limbs? Of organs? Of a brain that harbors thoughts and feelings and fears?

“Those are the mysteries still being uncovered,” says Celeste Nelson, a developmental bioengineer at Princeton University who studies developmental mechanics and coauthored an article on aspects of the topic in the Annual Review of Biomedical Engineering. “The best guess is that yes, mechanical force is important and mechanical stresses are essential. But what exact signals are being sent, and how those are being translated into alterations in cells at these early stages, is still a bit unclear. This is what half of my lab is working on right now.”

 

Sensing force

The clues to how this all works, Nelson says, might be revealed by studying how cells sense force in the first place — and there are a few different ways a cell can pull this off.

It can use stretch-sensitive ion channels, tiny valves in the cell membrane that let charged atoms like calcium flow in and out, triggering a variety of biochemical signals. Or it can exploit cell-cell junctions, points where certain types of cells are “spot-welded” to their neighbors by globs of proteins.

It could also be leaning on well-studied structures that sense forces during development: clusters of proteins called focal adhesions.

These adhesions anchor cells to the extracellular matrix, the fibrous scaffold that surrounds them. And as that scaffold pulls or stretches a focal adhesion, two things happen: First, proteins inside the adhesion trigger a flood of biochemical signals that alter structural functions inside the cell. Second, and more profoundly, the focal adhesion tugs on a vast structural web inside of cells, called the cytoskeleton.

This mesh acts like a series of I beams and guy wires, supporting the cell membrane and lending the cell its overall shape and form. Crucially, it also connects the focal adhesions to the cell’s nucleus, where its DNA is stored. And that, says Jan Lammerding, a biomedical engineer at Cornell University, could be one of the keys to how physical force influences a cell’s fate.

Any force on the cell’s surface, he says, may be transmitted through the cytoskeleton and passed on to the nucleus, which itself will be stretched or twisted. As the nucleus is squished around, some genes inside it will be newly exposed, and become more active. Others will be suddenly hidden, making them less active. In effect, it may be possible to modify the genetic function of a cell just by yanking on its nucleus.

 

This illustration shows how forces on the outside of the cell can be sensed deep within it. Mechanical forces in the extracellular matrix push and pull on the exterior of a cell. The forces are detected by the focal adhesion at the cell membrane. The signals are transmitted via the cytoskeleton to the nucleus. There, the detected forces can turn genes on or off by changing the shape of chromosomes or opening nuclear pores to let signaling molecules in.

 

Those changes go both ways. When the nucleus senses force, proteins inside it called Lamin A pile together en masse, making the organelle stiffer. As the nucleus hardens, it can alter the activity of genes inside it, and some of these changes can set off a chain of events that makes the extracellular matrix stiffer. The matrix, in turn, exerts even stronger forces back into the cell.

This constant push and pull between a cell and its matrix creates a powerful feedback loop. Any changes in the cell will trigger changes in the matrix; any changes in the matrix will trigger even more changes in the cell, and with each iteration, the cell is steered further and further toward its final incarnation, be it a muscle cell, nerve cell, liver cell or any other cell in the body. Sheets or clusters of those differentiated cells expand and fold and, steered by mechanical forces and other inputs, come to sculpt whole organs.

 

Matters of the heart

In truly poetic fashion, the first organ to emerge in a human embryo is the heart. It starts as a loosely organized tube, explains Dennis Discher, a bioengineer at the University of Pennsylvania, and as it grows, the cells within it harden gradually more each day. That’s a fact cynics everywhere will relish. But according to a 2016 study by Discher and his lab, this hardening may be responsible for the fact that the heart beats at all.

Inside the nascent organ, molecules of Lamin A collect inside the nucleus of cells called cardiac myocytes, causing them to stiffen and elongate. At the same time, the cells exude an increasing amount of collagen, a tough, stringy protein that hardens the extracellular matrix around them. The forces each exerts on the other progressively increase, like a game of cellular tug-of-war, until they reach a critical threshold, Discher says.

As the forces hit that breaking point, a cell somewhere in the mix will spontaneously contract, yank on its neighbors and cause them to contract as well. The resulting chain reaction ripples out among the cardiac cells, triggering an initial heartbeat. “As soon as you get one contracting a certain amount, if it’s connected to all the other cells around it mechanically, then it’s going to set off a reaction called a peristaltic wave that goes on down the line,” Discher says.

Thanks to the constant feedback between forces inside and outside the cells, every pulse of that wave will increase the stiffness of the cardiac cells and the scaffold they sit in, progressively steering the cells’ development. Gradually, that and other inputs will lead them to morph into the specialized, four-chambered muscle that sustains us throughout our lives.

A similar process may happen as lungs and other organs develop. As cells there mature and tissues stiffen, ones that formerly grew in flat sheets (epithelial cells) change their arrangement. This shuffling exerts new forces that can cause the sheets to buckle and fold, like a pair of hands pushing on a tablecloth. Those folds start to rise out from the sheet, creating bud-like shapes that lend organs their initial three-dimensional structures.

“The way you get the patterns of almost all your tissues is through progressive budding or branching in fractal-like ways. All of these patterns are dependent on branches on top of branches, or buds on top of buds,” Ingber says.

 

Squeezing out a tooth

Given the number of buds that grow on top of each other in a lung or a pancreas or a liver, breaking down how mechanical forces shape such complex structures is no easy task. “In the pancreas or in blood vessels, there are millions of branches and buds, in all three dimensions,” Ingber says. Instead, the best way to get a sense of how the process occurs is to distill it down to the formation of a single bud.

With that in mind, in an elegant 2011 study, he and his colleagues focused on one of the only organs that emerges naturally from a lone bud — a tooth. Rather than needing millions of branches to form its structure, it requires only one. That branch grows in two sections: a part that bows out to form the exterior, and another that pops inward to form roots. By investigating how and when those sections grew, Ingber’s team hoped to unravel the role of physical force in the process.

Researchers had known for years that proteins called motility factors play a role in this process. Usually, they beckon cells to grow toward them like diehard fans flocking toward a celebrity, which squeezes them together into a dense, taut mass. But what if the growth factors were just a means to an end? What if the key to tooth development wasn’t those proteins themselves, but the physical squeezing that they cause as cells crowd together?

To test this idea, Ingber and his colleagues first removed growth factors from the equation, and found that tooth development ground to a halt. Then they tried growing the developing buds between two sheets of a rubbery polymer. Shockingly, as they squeezed those sheets together, the tooth’s normal formation started once again. The scientists later showed that cells started to mineralize and lay down what looked like dentin, a key toothy building block. The force exerted on the cells by the polymer sheets alone was enough to kick off the entire cascade of development.

 

A tooth bud — the first step in tooth formation — arises in response to pressure on a flat sheet of cells called the dental epithelium. The pressure comes from the accumulation of mobile mesenchymal cells in the tissue below, which pile up like Black Friday shoppers rushing to enter a store but finding the door is locked. The crush of cells triggers a pressure-sensitive response that causes the tooth bud to form.

 

When force goes awry

The physical forces in and around early cells may spark the formation of organs — but they can also cause the body to fail in spectacular ways. An entire laundry list of seemingly unrelated diseases can be linked to errors in how cells sense force during and after development.

Spina bifida, a condition where an embryonic structure called the neural tube (which eventually forms the brain and spinal cord) fails to close, is connected to a breakdown in cellular forces, new research suggests. Likewise, cleft palate, which occurs when two sides of a person’s palate are deformed, could be caused by force-sensing gone awry at specific points during embryonic development.

Sometimes, the effects of these force-sensing glitches can lead to problems later in life, notes Lammerding. Some types of muscular dystrophy, a disease that results in muscle atrophy over time, may be linked to a breakdown in force-sensing mechanisms within muscle cells.

“Normally if you go to the gym to exercise, the muscles will adapt to the higher mechanical load,” Lammerding says. When muscle tissue feels the physical force of weight pulling on it, the cells inside it lay down more fibers of proteins called actin and myosin in their cytoskeletons. The more of those fibers the muscle cells contain, the stronger they get.

But in one form of the disease called Emery-Dreifuss muscular dystrophy, the cells have trouble sensing the forces stretching them, so they can’t create more muscle fiber in response to the load. As a result, they don’t grow stronger with exercise, and instead atrophy slowly on the bone. Although the symptoms of the disease set in several years after birth, their root cause is a breakdown in cellular force sensing, Lammerding says.

 

New treatments

For many of these diseases, there’s currently no way to prevent them before they emerge. But bioengineers are searching for new ways to harness the physical forces that shape cell development, and might one day be able to apply them in treatments.

The dream goal, Nelson says, would be to use mechanical force, along with other inputs, to grow tissues and organs on demand in the lab — a development that could do away with long waiting lists for transplants in patients with life-threatening diseases. “Ultimately, what I want to do is know this well enough that we can take a population of maybe a hundred cells, put them in a dish and provide them with two or three initiating stimuli, and have them build themselves into a lung,” she says. Granted, the idea is far-fetched, but based on how quickly research is progressing, she thinks we may see success in a decade or less.

In the meantime, other researchers are working on more immediate applications. Ingber, for one, is taking what he’s learning about the way cellular scaffolds and mechanical forces affect development to create lifelike organ tissues in the lab.

To accomplish that feat, he’s artificially steering the development of cells by growing them on surfaces that mimic the physical and chemical environment of specific organs. With the right mechanical stimulation, he says, cells placed there will develop into a fully formed layer of organ tissue. The result, called an organ-on-a-chip, provides a thin cross section of working kidney, liver or other organ, complete with its own three-dimensional structure.

Devices like these, he adds, could provide accurate models of full-sized organs within tiny pieces of translucent material, letting scientists and drug companies test new treatments for disease more rapidly and effectively than ever before.

Other researchers want to manipulate cellular forces to treat severe wounds. Treena Arinzeh, a biomedical engineer at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, is working to develop new types of materials that could help regrow large sections of missing bone, doing away with the need for metal implants or grafts from cadavers. By putting stem cells on a specially engineered scaffold — a sort of spongy structure made in the lab — she provides them with a bed that has just the right amount of stiffness to coax them into becoming bone and cartilage cells.

This, she hopes, can one day help treat injuries from trauma, weakened bones from osteoporosis, and potentially a whole host of other conditions. “Even though the fundamental science is still developing, we are trying to at least take some of that knowledge and develop therapies out of it,” she says. “We’re probably only right at the tip of the iceberg in terms of what we can do.”

As with any cutting-edge science, the knowledge that emerges from research like this will inform the next questions scientists ask to understand how the body takes shape. Eventually, cellular force-sensing might even become the basis for a radical new interpretation of developmental biology. The research is still in its early stages, and there are still many open mysteries about the ways mechanical forces steer the fate of cells. But the answers to those puzzles — and the new medical treatments that they enable — may surface within our lifetime.

Until then, I won’t need to look very far to revel in the unlikely miracle of the human form. Like all new parents, I’m struck each day by the profound wonder of a tiny person developing before my eyes. The growing confidence of little feet plodding across a bare wood floor; the wailing cries that arrive as new teeth sprout from sensitive gums; the tiniest milestones, new abilities and revelatory moments of a new body coming into its own — all of those made possible by the complex ballet of cells and tissue unfolding to create a small, sweet, curious little boy.


 

This article originally appeared in Knowable Magazine, an independent journalistic endeavor from Annual Reviews. Sign up for the newsletter.

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Categories: Highlights, Research