My name is Andrea Murillo, and I am delighted to share that I am the new Community Manager for the Node. I started my research journey as a physiologist and later found my way into endocrinology during my PhD, where I worked with my favourite worm and developmental model species, Capitella teleta. Throughout my PhD, I investigated components of the estrogen signalling pathway across life stages of C. teleta. That is how the wonder of developmental biology first wormed its way into my heart.
After finishing my PhD, I started working for The Company of Biologists as the Science Communications Officer. In that role, my passion for science communication grew, and my appreciation for biology deepened as I wrote about the Company’s fantastic journal content across many fields. But it was the science and the community surrounding the Node and Development that truly hooked me (I will stop with the worm puns now!).
As Community Manager, I am excited to build on the great work done by Eva, Cat, Aidan, Helen and Joyce and to continue some of our users’ favourite series and features. In my previous role, I worked closely with both my predecessor, Joyce, and the two Community Managers from our sister sites: Reinier from preLights and Helen from FocalPlane. I am thrilled to be a part of the team as the Node Community Manager, a transition which they have generously supported. I’m planning to bring some of my own fresh ideas to the Node, and I hope you will like them.
My first chance to meet some of you in person will be at the British Society for Developmental Biology 2026 Spring Meeting next week. If you are attending, please stop by and say hello. I am really excited to learn about your research and, most of all, to meet the people who make great developmental biology and stem cell research happen.
Preprints have become an indispensable part of our research ecosystem. Over the last 10 years, the biological community has witnessed an exponential growth in both submissions and readership of preprints. Arguably, the main drivers behind this growth are the ability of preprints to speed up the dissemination of research and broaden access to results long before formal publication.
Development and our not-for-profit publisher, The Company of Biologists, have a long history of actively supporting preprints (Prosée and Brown, 2025). In 2018, the Company launched preLights, a community-run platform that highlights noteworthy preprints across the biological sciences. Over time, preLights has evolved to provide support and training for early-career researchers to develop their writing skills for summarising and critiquing new work. In addition, Development’s own community site, the Node, posts monthly preprint lists from developmental biology and related fields. These lists are among the most-read posts on the Node, demonstrating the value of preprints within our community. Over time, preLights, the Node and Development have started working together more closely to highlight noteworthy preprints; a recent collaboration between preLights and the Node saw the introduction of curated preprint highlights in the form of ‘preLighters’ choice’ posts and a selection of preLights posts from the stem cell and developmental biology community feature in the journal as quarterly ‘Preprint Highlights’.
As part of this preprint ecosystem, Development launched its ‘In preprints’ series in early 2022 to bring curated, contextualised coverage of preprinted findings directly to our readership (Briscoe and Grewal, 2022). These articles are intended to complement other initiatives, such as preLights, in guiding readers to the preprints that matter the most in the field. We know that Development’s ‘In preprints’ articles receive, on average, over a thousand views within the first 12 months of publication and continue to be read in the years that follow. Development has now published around 60 ‘In preprints’ articles on topics ranging from single-cell lineage tracing techniques (Rodriguez-Fraticelli and Morris, 2022) to human stem cell-based embryo models (Moris and Sturmey, 2023) and Polycomb complexes (Iwasaki et al., 2023) to leaf-shape transitions (Byrne, 2024). You can browse all the ‘In preprints’ articles published to date in our dedicated subject collection.
Preprints featured in these articles have mainly been selected by Development’s in-house Reviews Editors. We are now expanding this initiative by appointing a small group of Preprint Editors – active researchers with their finger on the pulse of preprint literature – to commission and write ‘In preprints’ articles. This is an exciting opportunity to co-curate the preprint literature directly with members of the Development community, bringing specialist expertise and diverse perspectives to bear on an ever-growing body of work. We intend to appoint Preprint Editors who represent specialist topics within the broader scope of Development, and we hope that, as expert academics, they will be able to identify and highlight the best preprints from their fields as part of their routine exploration of the research literature.
We are currently accepting applications for Preprint Editors, and our call will close on Monday 30 March 2026. Applicants with at least 3 years of postdoctoral experience or principal investigators from any career stage are welcome to apply. In exchange for their contributions to the project, Preprint Editors will receive formal recognition and financial remuneration, including the option to receive support to attend relevant conferences. To find out more about this initiative, please visit our webpage: https://journals.biologists.com/dev/pages/preprint-editors.
We look forward to working with our first Preprint Editors following their appointment later this year to further strengthen our coverage of important preprinted work. We also anticipate that this programme will continue to evolve in response to community needs. This next step marks our commitment to supporting the reach of preprinted work and bringing curated, quality research to the attention of our community.
Biology Open is proud to partner with the European Zebrafish Society (EZS) to offer travel grants for the 13th European Zebrafish Meeting (EZM2026) to be held 7-11 July 2026 in Vienna, Austria. This travel grant is designed to provide financial support for early-career researchers based in the Global South.
The aim is to strengthen links for future collaboration and enhance the researcher’s career opportunities, which is in line with The Company of Biologists’ core value of supporting biologists.
More information and an application form can be found on the EZS website.
In February, we hear from three early-career researchers studying neural development. Chaired by one of Development’s first Pathway to Independence fellows, Polina Kameneva, Principal Investigator at St. Anna Children’s Cancer Research Institute (CCRI) in Vienna, Austria. Polina’s group uses 2D and 3D human stem cell models to recapitulate adrenal gland cell development to understand the onset of neuroblastoma.
Wednesday 25 February – 15:00 GMT/UTC
Joaquín Navajas Acedo (University of Basel) ‘Spatiotemporal emergence of somatosensory neuron diversity’
Carlo Donato Caiaffa (Universidade de São Paulo) ‘Decoding the role of HNRNPH2 in neural development using brain organoids and antisense oligonucleotides’
Clarisse Brunet (Institut Curie) ‘Decoding the gliogenic switch: how human brain organoids reveal the secrets of glial cell fate’
At the speakers’ discretion, the webinar will be recorded to view on demand. To see the other webinars scheduled in our series, and to catch up on previous talks, please visit: thenode.biologists.com/devpres
As scientists, we are all are works in progress and continually developing in our own ways. Each of us brings unique strengths and skills along with challenges, and these can change during the course of our careers. Still, there are some common themes to what makes for an effective scientist, and these can provide useful benchmarks for evaluating our progress and planning the path ahead. This article on helpimascientist.com defines several stages of scientific development, with the intention to promote honest self reflection, open conversations, and aid in helping to set goals.
Here we showcase work from Craig Zuckerman, a digital fine artist whose work draws on scientific imagery to create immersive visual environments. With a background in medical illustration and animation, he now works at the intersection of science and fine art, using digital tools to explore form, light, and colour in ways that invite reflection and quiet attention.
Dynamic surface: lipid membrane surface proteins
Can you describe your artistic practice and how science informs it?
My work transforms cellular and subcellular structures into generative frameworks, moving beyond scientific description into poetic abstraction. Microscopy becomes a language for exploring form, colour, and spatial complexity. Each piece creates a tension between what is biologically recognisable and what is purely atmospheric.
I use scientific structures as scaffolding and use them for creating cinematic environments that resist literal interpretation. My digital work becomes a place to sculpt form, colour, and space with precision, constructing environments that feel immersive and contemplative. Microscopic systems are expanded into vast, navigable landscapes. This shift in scale invites viewers to inhabit the unseen, reframing the body’s interior as a place of wonder, serenity, and emotional resonance.
Luminous currents: daughter cell budding off of host cell
Structures in transition: organic cell demise
How do light, colour, and materiality function in your work?
Light functions as a structural force, creating depth and atmosphere. Colour becomes a psychological and emotional driver, guiding the viewer’s experience and transforming biological forms into meditative spaces. These environments invite contemplative gazing. They create a sense of inwardness, mirroring the quiet intelligence of living systems and offering viewers a space for reflection, grounding, and calm.
My limited edition prints on aluminium and plexiglass emphasise physicality, durability, and concreteness. Editioning becomes a conceptual gesture, establishing boundaries around reproducibility and reinforcing the singularity of each work.
Synaptic pulse: neurotransmitters traveling along neuronal axons
Where does your inspiration come from, and how has it informed your artistic practice?
I am a digital fine artist whose work is inspired by science, with a background in medical illustration and animation. My practice marks a deliberate shift from applied science visualisation to autonomous fine art, using cellular structures as generative frameworks rather than clinical subjects.
Now working exclusively in the digital discipline, I construct immersive, cinematic environments in various 3D software that occupy the intersection of abstraction and representation. Colour, light, and composition function as primary structural elements, transforming microscopic systems into expansive spatial experiences. I now use science as a starting point to create biolandscapes.
I have always been influenced by prominent illustrators, from the golden age of illustration through the 1980s, as well as artists from the Renaissance, landscape artists, and sculptors. I continue to create more work in this space, constantly challenging myself with respect to technique, colour, composition, and scientific knowledge.
Conception: sperm cell penetrating egg cell
What advice would you give to others interested in your SciArt approach and where can they find more of your work?
To anyone who has interest in pursuing this approach, it is most important to grow as a visual artist — i.e. use of colour, composition, lighting, drawing and painting skills, or in the software of your choice.
Do cells carry memories of the whole body into the next generation?
For more than two millennia, biologists and philosophers have debated whether traits acquired during life can be inherited. From Hippocrates and Aristotle to Lamarck and Darwin, this idea repeatedly surfaced but was ultimately set aside due to the absence of a convincing biological mechanism.
Recent advances in epigenetics have reopened this question.
In a recent paper, DOI: 10.1016/j.cdev.2024.203928 I propose a conceptual framework for how environmentally induced epigenetic information might be transmitted from somatic tissues to germ cells—not solely through diffusible molecules, but through cellular movement combined with fate plasticity.
A traveler stem cell hypothesis
The central idea is that certain pluripotent or highly plastic adult stem cells—potentially including germline-associated stem cells—may act as epigenetic travelers. These cells could circulate through the body, enter developmentally active or regenerating tissues, and undergo cycles of differentiation or transdifferentiation in response to local cues. During these transitions, they would acquire tissue-specific epigenetic modifications.
Importantly, these cells would not remain terminally committed. Through dedifferentiation or further transdifferentiation, they could revert to an uncommitted state while retaining accumulated epigenetic information. During gametogenesis, such cells might be recruited back to the gonads, where they ultimately contribute to germ cells—carrying with them epigenetic memory collected across multiple somatic environments.
What the image illustrates
The accompanying schematic visualizes this concept: pluripotent “traveler” stem cells move between tissues, repeatedly cycling through differentiation, dedifferentiation, and transdifferentiation. Over time, they integrate epigenetic inputs from diverse organs before re-entering the germline, offering a potential cellular route for soma-to-germline information transfer.
Existing biological foundations
Crucially, elements of this process are not purely hypothetical. Across many multicellular organisms—including plants, invertebrates, and vertebrates—intergenerational and transgenerational epigenetic inheritance has already been experimentally demonstrated. Epigenetic information can persist through extensive developmental reprogramming events and across multiple generations, indicating that biological systems possess robust mechanisms for preserving epigenetic memory.
Moreover, it has been shown that germ cells or germline-associated stem cells are not irreversibly restricted to reproductive fate. Under specific developmental or experimental conditions, germ cells have been observed to generate diverse somatic cell types. Conversely, somatic or pluripotent stem cells can be induced to acquire germ cell identity and contribute to functional gametes. These bidirectional fate transitions challenge a strict interpretation of the soma–germline barrier and establish that germline and somatic identities are more plastic than traditionally assumed.
Together, these observations provide a biological foundation for considering mobile, fate-plastic cells as integrators and carriers of epigenetic information across tissues.
Why this matters
This framework does not contradict existing models of epigenetic inheritance involving small RNAs or other molecular mediators. Instead, it complements them by addressing a key unresolved problem: how complex, tissue-specific epigenetic states accumulated across an organism’s lifetime might be integrated and transmitted coherently to the next generation.
If experimentally validated, this idea could have implications for developmental biology, evolution, aging, regenerative medicine, and disease inheritance.
A question for the community
If highly plastic stem cells can act as mobile carriers of epigenetic memory, how might we experimentally trace their movements, fate transitions, and epigenetic histories across tissues and generations?
I would welcome thoughts on experimental strategies—or alternative interpretations—that could test or challenge this hypothesis.
Spotted a preprint in this list that you love? If you’re keen to gain some science writing experience and be part of a friendly, diverse and international community, consider joining preLights and writing a preprint highlight article.
Recognizing dUTPase as a mitotic factor essential for early embryonic development Nikolett Nagy, Otília Tóth, Eszter Oláh, László Henn, Gergely Attila Rácz, Edit Szabó, György Várady, Fanni Beatrix Vigh, Zita Réka Golács, Martin Urbán, Tímea Pintér, Orsolya Ivett Hoffmann, László Hiripi, Hilde Loge Nilsen, Angéla Békési, Miklós Erdélyi, Elen Gócza, Gergely Róna, Judit Tóth, Beáta G. Vértessy
Single-cell spatially resolved transcriptomic characterization of the developing mouse cochlea Philippe Jean, Sabrina Mechaussier, Amrit Singh-Estivalet, Céline Trébeau, Aurore Gaudin, Laura Barrio Cano, Andrea Lelli, Fabienne Wong Jun Tai, Sébastien Megharba, Sandrine Schmutz, Sarra Loulizi, Sophie Novault, David Hardy, Carolina Moraes-Cabe, Milena Hasan, Christine Petit, Raphael Etournay, Nicolas Michalski
Scalable high-fidelity human vascularized cortical assembloids recapitulate neurovascular co-development and cell specialization Shubhang Bhalla, Belda Gulsuyu, Damian Sanchez, Jayden M. Ross, Santhosh Arul, Adnan Gopinadhan, Muhammet Öztürk, Tanzila Mukhtar, Jonathan J. Augustin, Jerry C. Wang, Joseph Kim, Chang N. Kim, Sena Oten, Yohei Rosen, John M. Bernabei, Vijay Letchuman, Shantel Weinsheimer, Helen Kim, Elizabeth E. Crouch, Edward F. Chang, David Haussler, Mircea Teodorescu, Arnold R. Kriegstein, Tomasz J. Nowakowski, Ethan A. Winkler
Novel repressors of cambium activity in Arabidopsis Xing Wang, Jingyi Han, Emma K. Turley, Riikka Mäkilä, Anne-Maarit Bågman, Julia M. Kraus, Qing He, Hanan Alhowty, Joanna Edwards, Yuqi Li, Raluca Blasciuc, Wiktoria Fatz, Wenbin Wei, Miguel de Lucas, Siobhán M. Brady, Shixue Zheng, Chunli Chen, Ari Pekka Mäh-önen, J. Peter Etchells
In vitro sexual dimorphism establishment in schistosomes Remi Pichon, Magda E Lotkowska, Jude L. D. Bulathsinghalage, Madeleine McMath, Mary Evans, Benjamin J. Hulme, Kirsty Ambridge, Geetha Sankaranarayanan, Simon Kershenbaum, Sarah D. Davey, Josephine E. Forde-Thomas, Karl F. Hoffmann, Matthew Berriman, Gabriel Rinaldi
Leveraging a hybrid cross-disciplinary training model to accelerate global bioinformatics capacity Taras K. Oleksyk, Daryna Yakymenko, Sylwia Bożek, Viorel Munteanu, Wojciech Pilch, Zoia Comarova, Victor Gordeev, Grigore Boldirev, Dumitru Ciorbă, Viorel Bostan, Christopher E. Mason, Alexander G. Lucaci, Nadiia Kasianchuk, Daria Nishchenko, Victoria Popic, Andrei Lobiuc, Mihai Covasa, Martin Hölzer, Joanna Polanska, Alex Zelikovsky, Vasili Braga, Mihai Dimian, Paweł Łabaj, Serghei Mangul
Cloud-Connected Pluripotent Stem Cell Platform Enhances Scientific Identity in Underrepresented Students Samira Vera-Choqqueccota, Drew Ehrlich, Vladimir Luna-Gomez, Sebastian Hernandez, Jesus Gonzalez-Ferrer, Hunter E. Schweiger, Kateryna Voitiuk, Yohei Rosen, Kivilcim Doganyigit, Isabel Cline, Rebecca Ward, Erika Yeh, Karen H. Miga, Barbara Des Rochers, Sri Kurniawan, David Haussler, Kristian López Vargas, Mircea Teodorescu, Mohammed A. Mostajo-Radji
OurJanuary webinar featured two early-career researchers studying development, evolution and the environment. Here, we share the talks from Chee Kiang (Ethan) Ewe (Tel Aviv University) and Max Farnworth (University of Bristol).
If you are in the pancreas field, you may be either part of the endocrine or the exocrine band. Now, this may not be like the Sharks and the Jets in West Side Story, but you better know your position. Whether this separation reflects the actual spatial segregation of both compartments and their different embryonic development is an idea perhaps worth exploring. In any case, our question was linked precisely to that spatial segregation: why do both compartments develop in different regions of the organ?
First of all, we know that what lies around the pancreatic epithelium (what we call the microenvironment) is crucial for its development. Since the 60s1, great works have progressively characterised the microenvironment with greater and greater detail, from early elegant experiments using explants, to more elaborate mouse genetics studies where specific cellular components and signalling pathways were perturbed2,3. The single-cell revolution brought a new twist: the degree of cellular heterogeneity populating the microenvironment, especially mesenchymal cells, was much higher than anticipated. The question then was: how is this heterogeneity spatially distributed?
Mapping the pancreas and deciphering maps.
Spatial transcriptomics (ST) appeared to us the best way to answer the question, but at the time we started the project, sequencing-based approaches did not provide the resolution needed to map a small, branched organ like the embryonic pancreas. On the other hand, image-based approaches only allowed for mapping the expression of a handful of markers. Thanks to the early discussions Francesca Spagnoli (PI of the lab) had with Cartana, the biotech at Karolinska Institute, which developed the In Situ Sequencing (ISS) technology and was later acquired by 10x Genomics, we were able to pioneer this approach. In parallel, access to the first single-cell RNASeq datasets of the murine embryonic pancreas -from our lab and others in the field4– enabled us to identify the most informative set of marker genes and design robust panels for the ISS experiments. Running the ISS technology on pancreas was not immediately immediately straightforward; it required considerable effort and a series of optimization experiments carried out by me and another postdoc in the lab., Jean Francois Darrigrand. Finally, by profiling the spatial distribution of sets of markers, we were able to create a cartography of the mouse embryonic pancreas (Fig. 1).
Fig. 1 ISS image of selected marker genes in E17.5 pancreas. Close-ups of selected probe genes and their spatial distribution in the tissue are shown in (i) and (ii) dashed boxes.
But a map is only an instrument, and the information obtained from it will largely depend on how you read it. When analysing a geographical map, your answers may vary depending on the level of aggregation: you can look at it from the country perspective, zoom in and separate by region or zoom in even more and analyse every city and small town independently. Similarly, when observing an organ, one can use different magnification lenses. First, the pancreas originates from two groups of progenitor cells growing independently (dorsal and ventral pancreatic buds), until they fuse around E14.5 in the mouse embryo. As shown in the 3D images below, generated by a PhD student in the lab, Anna Salowka, the architecture of each bud is not homogeneous along its axes. At the organ level, we discovered that the mesenchyme surrounding the ventral and dorsal pancreas is distinct (Fig. 2A). Furthermore, along the dorsal pancreas -from the duodenum to the region next to the spleen- specific mesenchyme subsets are selectively enriched (Fig. 2B).
Fig. 2 (A) Representative ISS image showing selected genes in dorsal pancreas (DP) and ventral pancreas (VP) at E12.5. Scale bar, 100 μm. (B) Representative three-dimensional (3D) rendering of light-sheet fluorescent microscopy image (left) and confocal microscopy images (right) of E12.5 pancreas stained with indicated antibodies. Right: Confocal IF images show transverse cryosections of DP at tail (i) and stalk (ii) levels. Hoechst was used as nuclear counterstain. Scale bars, 100 μm. Asterisk indicates approximate position of the spleen.
To increase the resolution of our analysis to meso- and micro- scales (Fig. 3), Gabriel Herrera (at the time rotation student in the lab) brough into the project his bioinformatic skills to implement pipelines to analyse the spatial data. What we found is that the tissue is organised in concentrical niches enriched in mesothelial, mesenchymal, exocrine or endocrine cells. When comparing exocrine and endocrine niches, we found that proliferative mesenchyme was preferentially located around acinar cells, whereas another subset, which we termed Mesenchyme (M)-II, was enriched in the endocrine niche.
Fig. 3 Schematics of the spatial analysis frameworks: At cellular scale (left), spatial neighborhoods encompassing the 10 closest cells around each cell were used to calculate cluster pair neighborhood enrichment; at tissue scale (right), tissue areas with similar local cell type composition were clustered to identify tissue domains.
We then focused on the latter association and identified putative Ligand:Receptor interactions between M-II and endocrine cells (Fig. 4). In particular, Wnt5a and Collagen VI molecules caught our attention because of their potential role in creating a niche favourable for endocrine and, specifically, beta-cell differentiation. Consistently, functional experiments using mouse pancreatic explants demonstrated that blocking Wnt5a signaling hampered endocrinogenesis by perturbing the JNK pathway. On the other hand, explants treated with Collagen VI showed a higher number of endocrine cells. By examining human foetal pancreatic tissue, Georgina Goss, a postdoc in the lab, showed that Collagen VI is also enriched around human endocrine cells. Finally, I went on embedding human iPSC-derived endocrine cells in hydrogels containing different ECM mixes, and discovered that Collagen VI, in a conserved fashion, increased the number of beta-cells in the cultures.
To complete our study, we decided to have a glimpse of the adult pancreas. What we found is that different mesenchyme subsets are enriched inside and around islets of Langerhans, ducts and acini. A long-standing question in the field is to track the origin of the adult pancreatic mesenchyme. Our dataset enabled us to fill this gap. Using in silico analysis, we identified fate trajectories connecting the embryonic and adult mesenchyme. Our results suggested that the Spleno-Pancreatic mesenchyme could be one of the origins of the adult mesenchyme which we confirmed using in vivo lineage tracing.
Fig 4: Spatial organization of the pancreatic mesenchyme during embryonic development
What’s next?
Several questions remain open, and several arose during the project. If the pancreatic tissue is carefully distributed, how is that architecture shaped? What signals link epithelial compartments to the formation of their surrounding microenvironment? Our results also raise questions regarding the function of the different levels of organisation: Why does pancreas development need gradients of signalling along the proximodistal axis? It would be interesting to test whether the disruption of that axis causes defects in the separation of the pancreas and surrounding organs. Further research is also needed to understand the function of the secretion of specific ECM components, such as Collagen VI, around exocrine and endocrine cells. In the case of Collagen VI, it would be interesting to investigate how it affects tissue stiffness, as it has been shown that control of the mechanotransducer YAP is crucial for endocrinogenesis. Finally, the spatial organization of the microenvironment during human embryonic development needs further characterization, but using similar approaches we are now beginning to understand it, so if you want to know a little bit more about it, check out the new preprint from the lab5.
Access the article: Torres-Cano, A., Darrigrand, J. F., Herrera-Oropeza, G., Goss, G., Willnow, D., Salowka, A., Ma, S., Chitnis, D., Rouault, M., Vigilante, A., & Spagnoli, F. M. (2025). Spatially organized cellular communities shape functional tissue architecture in the pancreas. Sci Adv, 11(46), eadx5791. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adx5791
References
1. Golosow, N. & Grobstein, C. Epitheliomesenchymal interaction in pancreatic morphogenesis. Developmental Biology4, doi:10.1016/0012-1606(62)90042-8 (1962/04/01).
2. L, L. et al. Pancreatic mesenchyme regulates epithelial organogenesis throughout development – PubMed. PLoS biology9, doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001143 (2011 Sep).
3. C, C. et al. A Specialized Niche in the Pancreatic Microenvironment Promotes Endocrine Differentiation – PubMed. Developmental cell55, doi:10.1016/j.devcel.2020.08.003 (10/26/2020).
4. Byrnes, L. E. et al. Lineage dynamics of murine pancreatic development at single-cell resolution. Nature Communications 2018 9:19, doi:10.1038/s41467-018-06176-3 (2018-09-25).
5. Goss, G. et al. Mesodermal-niche interactions direct specification and differentiation of pancreatic islet cells in human multilineage organoids. bioRxiv, 2025.2012.2013.694117, doi:10.64898/2025.12.13.694117 (2025).
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