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developmental and stem cell biologists

March in preprints

Posted by , on 8 April 2022

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

The preprints this month are hosted on bioRxiv, arXiv and preprints.org – use these links to get to the section you want.

Developmental biology

Cell Biology

Modelling

Reviews

Tools & Resources

Research practice & education

Developmental biology

| Patterning & signalling

Cytoneme contacts in Drosophila from Du, et al.

GPI-anchored FGF directs cytoneme-mediated bidirectional signaling to self-regulate tissue-specific dispersion
Lijuan Du, Alex Sohr, Yujia Li, Sougata Roy

Modelling global mRNA dynamics during Drosophila embryogenesis reveals a relationship between mRNA degradation and P-bodies
Lauren Forbes Beadle, Jennifer C. Love, Yuliya Shapovalova, Artem Artemev, Magnus Rattray, Hilary L. Ashe

Canonical Wnt Signaling and the Regulation of Divergent Mesenchymal Fgf8 expression in Axolotl Limb Development and Regeneration
Giacomo L. Glotzer, Pietro Tardivo, Elly M. Tanaka

Bone Morphogenetic Protein (BMP) signaling regulates germline stem cell self-renewal in the newly formed Drosophila testis stem cell niche
Merci N Best, Ashley Fidler, Marieke K Jones, Matthew Wawersik

High-resolution Ribosome Profiling Reveals Translational Selectivity for Transcripts in Bovine Preimplantation Embryo Development
Linkai Zhu, Tong Zhou, Rajan Iyyappan, Hao Ming, Yinjuan Wang, Michal Dvoran, Qi Chen, R. Michael Roberts, Andrej Susor, Zongliang Jiang

Combinatorial interactions of Hox genes establish appendage diversity of the amphipod crustacean Parhyale hawaiensis
Erin Jarvis Alberstat, Kevin Chung, Dennis A Sun, Shagnik Ray, Nipam H. Patel

Complement facilitates developmental microglial pruning of astrocyte and vascular networks
Gopalan Gnanaguru, Steven J. Tabor, Gracia M. Bonilla, Ruslan Sadreyev, Kentaro Yuda, Jörg Köhl, Kip M. Connor

Unmyelinated neurons use Neuregulin signals to promote myelination of neighboring neurons in the CNS
Daniel E. Lysko, William S. Talbot

Nr6a1 controls axially-restricted body elongation, segmentation, patterning and lineage allocation
Yi-Cheng Chang, Siew Fen Lisa Wong, Jan Schroeder, Gabriel M. Hauswirth, Natalia A Shylo, Emma L Moore, Annita Achilleos, Victoria Garside, Jose M. Polo, Jan Manent, Paul Trainor, Edwina McGlinn

Innexin function dictates the spatial relationship between distal somatic cells in the Caenorhabditis elegans gonad without impacting the germline stem cell pool
Theadora Tolkin, Ariz Mohammad, Todd Starich, Ken C. Q. Nguyen, David H. Hall, Tim Schedl, E. Jane Albert Hubbard, David Greenstein

Butterfly eyespots from Banerjee, et al.

Reuse of a wing venation gene-regulatory network in patterning the eyespot rings of butterflies
Tirtha Das Banerjee, Seah Kwi-Shan, Antónia Monteiro

Wnt and BMP signaling enhance melanocyte regeneration and suppress melanoma cell migration
Esra Katkat, Yeliz Demirci, Guillaume Heger, Irene Papatheodorou, Alvis Brazma, Gunes Ozhan

Dbx1 controls the development of astrocytes of the intermediate spinal cord by modulating Notch signaling
M. Micaela Sartoretti, Carla A. Campetella, Guillermo M. Lanuza

Ecdysone signaling controls early embryogenesis in the short-germ hemimetabolous insect Blattella germanica
Josefa Cruz, Oscar Maestro, Xavier Franch-Marro, David Martín

Lrig1 and Wnt dependent niches dictate segregation of resident immune cells and melanocytes in murine tail epidermis
Susanne C. Baess, Ann-Kathrin Burkhart, Sabrina Cappello, Annika Graband, Kristin Seré, Martin Zenke, Catherin Niemann, Sandra Iden

Distinct phospho-variants of STAT3 regulate naïve pluripotency and developmental pace in vivo
Takuya Azami, Sophie Kraunsoe, Graziano Martello, Yihan Pei, Thorsten Boroviak, Jennifer Nichols

Integrated analysis of Wnt signalling system component gene expression
Paula Murphy, Chris Armit, Bill Hill, S. Venkataraman, Patrick Frankel, Richard Baldock, Duncan Davidson

Hippo Signaling Cofactor, WWTR1, at the Crossroads of Human Trophoblast Progenitor Self-Renewal and Differentiation
Soma Ray, Abhik Saha, Ananya Ghosh, Namrata Roy, Ram P Kumar, Gudrun Meinhardt, Abhirup Mukerjee, Sumedha Gunewardena, Rajnish Kumar, Martin Knöfler, Soumen Paul

Cell size asymmetries in the sea star embryo
Barone Vanessa, Maria Byrne, Deirdre C. Lyons

Follicle cell contact maintains main body axis polarity in the Drosophila melanogaster oocyte
Ana Milas, Jorge de-Carvalho, Ivo A. Telley

The role of TGFβ signaling in Gli1+ tendon and enthesis cells
Lee Song, Mikhail Golman, Adam C. Abraham, Elazar Zelzer, Stavros Thomopoulos

Oncomodulin (OCM) uniquely regulates calcium signaling in neonatal cochlear outer hair cells
Kaitlin E. Murtha, Yang Yang, Federico Ceriani, Jing-Yi Jeng, Leslie K. Climer, Forrest Jones, Jack Charles, Sai K. Devana, Aubrey J. Hornak, Walter Marcotti, Dwayne D. Simmons

A cell non-autonomous FOXO/DAF-16-mediated germline quality assurance program that responds to somatic DNA damage
Gautam Chandra Sarkar, Umanshi Rautela, Anita Goyala, Sudeshna Datta, Nikhita Anand, Anupama Singh, Prachi Singh, Manish Chamoli, Arnab Mukhopadhyay

IFT20 governs mesenchymal stem cell fate through positively regulating TGF-β-Smad2/3-Glut1 signaling mediated glucose metabolism
Yang Li, Shuting Yang, Yang Liu, Ling Qin, Shuying Yang

Levels of p53 expression determine the competitive ability of embryonic stem cells during the onset of differentiation
Salvador Perez Montero, Sarah Bowling, Rubén Pérez-Carrasco, Tristan A. Rodriguez

| Morphogenesis & mechanics

Dynamic de novo adipose tissue development during metamorphosis in Drosophila melanogaster
Taiichi Tsuyama, Hanae Komai, Yusaku Hayashi, Kohei Shimono, Tadashi Uemura

Zebrafish cornea formation and homeostasis reflect robustness in camera-type eye biology, regardless of its environment
Kaisa Ikkala, Sini Raatikainen, Frederic Michon

Cardioblasts in Drosophila embryos from Balaghi, et al.

Myosin waves and a mechanical asymmetry guide the oscillatory migration of Drosophila cardiac progenitors
Negar Balaghi, Gonca Erdemci-Tandogan, Christopher McFaul, Rodrigo Fernandez-Gonzalez

Paf1C denoises transcription and growth patterns to achieve organ shape reproducibility
Duy-Chi Trinh, Marjolaine Martin, Lotte Bald, Alexis Maizel, Christophe Trehin, Olivier Hamant

Partial exogastrulation due to apical-basal polarity of F-actin distribution disruption in sea urchin embryo by omeprazole
Kaichi Watanabe, Yuhei Yasui, Yuta Kurose, Masashi Fujii, Takashi Yamamoto, Naoaki Sakamoto, Akinori Awazu

Plakoglobin is a mechanoresponsive regulator of naïve pluripotency
Timo N. Kohler, Joachim De Jonghe, Anna L. Ellerman, Ayaka Yanagida, Michael Herger, Erin M. Slatery, Katrin Fischer, Carla Mulas, Alex Winkel, Connor Ross, Sophie Bergmann, Kristian Franze, Kevin Chalut, Jennifer Nichols, Thorsten E. Boroviak, Florian Hollfelder

Patterned apoptosis modulates local growth and tissue shape in a fast-growing epithelium
Alexis Matamoro-Vidal, Tom Cumming, Anđela Davidović, Romain Levayer

Thymus formation in uncharted embryonic territories
Isabel Alcobia, Margarida Gama-Carvalho, Leonor Magalhães, Vitor Proa, Domingos Henrique, Hélia Neves

A hypomorphic mutation in Pold1 disrupts the coordination of embryo size expansion and morphogenesis during gastrulation
Tingxu Chen, Heather Alcorn, Sujan Devbhandari, Dirk Remus, Elizabeth Lacy, Danwei Huangfu, Kathryn V. Anderson

The multi-level regulation of clownfish metamorphosis by thyroid hormones
Natacha Roux, Saori Miura, Mélanie Dussene, Yuki Tara, Fiona Lee, Simon de Bernard, Mathieu Reynaud, Pauline Salis, Agneesh Barua, Abdelhay Boulahtouf, Patrick Balaguer, Karine Gauthier, David Lecchini, Yann Gibert, Laurence Besseau, Vincent Laudet

A tissue boundary orchestrates the segregation of inner ear sensory organs
Ziqi Chen, Shuting Xu, Magdalena Żak, Nicolas Daudet

Drosophila egg chambers from Osswald, et al.

Apical constriction induces tissue rupture in a proliferative epithelium
Mariana Osswald, André Barros-Carvalho, Ana M Carmo, Nicolas Loyer, Patricia C Gracio, Claudio Sunkel, Catarina C Homem, Jens Januschke, Eurico Morais-de-Sá

Retinal neuroblast migration and laminar organization requires the cytoskeletal-interacting protein Mllt11
Marley Blommers, Danielle Stanton-Turcotte, Angelo Iulianella

Rac1 controls cell turnover and mammary gland reversibility in post-partum involution
Aleksander Mironov, Matthew Fisher, Randa Elsayed, Melis Karabulutoglu, Nasreen Akhtar

A Morphogenetic Wave that Generates Mesenchymal-to-Epithelial Transition in the Lateral Plate Mesoderm
Manar Abboud Asleh, Mira Zaher, Julian Jadon, Lihi Shaulov, Ronit Yelin, Thomas M. Schultheiss

Mechanical stress driven by rigidity sensing governs epithelial stability
Surabhi Sonam, Lakshmi Balasubramaniam, Shao-Zhen Lin, Ying Ming Yow Ivan, Irina Pi Jaumà, Cecile Jebane, Marc Karnat, Yusuke Toyama, Philippe Marcq, Jacques Prost, René-Marc Mège, Jean-François Rupprecht, Benoît Ladoux

| Genes & genomes

Transcriptomics, Regulatory Syntax, and Enhancer Identification in Heterogenous Populations of Mesoderm-Induced ESCs at Single-Cell Resolution
Mamduh Khateb, Jelena Perovanovic, Kyung Dae Ko, Kan Jiang, Xuesong Feng, Natalia Acevedo-Luna, Jérome Chal, Veronica Ciuffoli, Pavol Genzor, James Simone, Astrid D. Haase, Olivier Pourquié, Stefania Dell’Orso, Vittorio Sartorelli

Molecular Signatures and Cellular Diversity During Mouse Habenula Development
Lieke L. van de Haar, Danai Riga, Juliska E. Boer, Youri Adolfs, Thomas E. Sieburgh, Roland E. van Dijk, Kyoko Watanabe, Nicky C.H. van Kronenburg, Mark H. Broekhoven, Danielle Posthuma, Frank J. Meye, Onur Basak, R. Jeroen Pasterkamp

The addition of antibiotics to embryo culture media caused altered expression of genes in pathways governing DNA integrity in mouse blastocysts
Qianqian Han, Yan Li, Xu Ji, Lu Chang, Wenjuan Li, Jianfeng Shi, Jing Liu, Wuhua Ni, Xuefeng Huang, Chris O’Neill, Xingliang Jin

GLOBAL HOST RESPONSES TO THE MICROBIOTA AT SINGLE CELL RESOLUTION IN GNOTOBIOTIC ZEBRAFISH
Michelle S. Massaquoi, Garth Kong, Daisy Chilin, Mary K. Hamilton, Ellie Melancon, Judith S. Eisen, Karen Guillemin

Genome-wide enrichment of histone marks in medaka embryos from Fukushima, et al.

Histone marks retained during epigenetic reprogramming and their roles essential for fish early development
Hiroto S. Fukushima, Hiroyuki Takeda, Ryohei Nakamura

Germline/soma distinction in Drosophila embryos requires regulators of zygotic genome activation
Megan M. Colonnetta, Paul Schedl, Girish Deshpande

TFAP2 paralogs facilitate chromatin access for MITF at pigmentation genes but inhibit expression of cell-cell adhesion genes independently of MITF
Colin Kenny, Ramile Dilshat, Hannah Seberg, Eric Van Otterloo, Gregory Bonde, Annika Helverson, Christopher M. Franke, Eiríkur Steingrímsson, Robert A. Cornell

Premature translation of the zygotic genome activator Zelda is not sufficient to precociously activate gene expression
Elizabeth D. Larson, Hideyuki Komori, Zoe A. Fitzpatrick, Samuel D. Krabbenhoft, Cheng-Yu Lee, Melissa Harrison

Fate and state transitions during human blood vessel organoid development
Marina T. Nikolova, Zhisong He, Reiner A. Wimmer, Makiko Seimiya, Jonas M. Nikoloff, Josef M. Penninger, J. Gray Camp, Barbara Treutlein

Simultaneously spatiotemporal gene expression and chromatin accessibility for mouse brain development
Fuqing Jiang, Xin Zhou, Yingying Qian, Li Wang, Qingmei Shen, Fangfang Qu, Guizhong Cui, Kai Chen, Guangdun Peng

Regionally distinct trophoblast regulate barrier function and invasion in the human placenta
Bryan Marsh, Yan Zhou, Mirhan Kapzidic, Susan Fisher, Robert Blelloch

Comparative developmental genomics of sex-biased gene expression in early embryogenesis across mammals
Victorya Richardson, Kai Zhang, Nora Engel, Rob J Kulathinal

Maternal H3K36 and H3K27 HMTs protect germline immortality via regulation of the transcription factor LIN-15B
Chad Cockrum, Susan Strome

Arginine 65 methylation of Neurogenin 3 by PRMT1 is a prerequisite for development of hESCs into pancreatic endocrine cells
Gahyang Cho, Kwangbeom Hyun, Jieun Choi, Eunji Shin, Bumsoo Kim, Jaehoon Kim, Hail Kim, Yong-Mahn Han

Developmental phenomics suggests that H3K4 monomethylation catalyzed by Trr functions as a phenotypic capacitor
Lautaro Gandara, Albert Tsai, Mans Ekelöf, Rafael Galupa, Ella Preger-Ben Noon, Theodore Alexandrov, Justin Crocker

Targeted deletion of uterine glandular Foxa2 induces embryonic diapause in mice
Mitsunori Matsuo, Jia Yuan, Yeon Sun Kim, Amanda Dewar, Hidetoshi Fujita, Sudhansu K. Dey, Xiaofei Sun

TRIM28-dependent SUMOylation protects the adult ovary from activation of the testicular pathway
Moïra Rossitto, Stephanie Déjardin, Chris M Rands, Stephanie Le Gras, Roberta Migale, Mahmoud-Reza Rafiee, Yasmine Neirijnck, Alain Pruvost, Anvi Laetitia Nguyen, Guillaume Bossis, Florence Cammas, Lionel Le Gallic, Dagmar Wilhelm, Robin Lovell-Badge, Brigitte Boizet-Bonhoure, Serge Nef, Francis Poulat

Quantitative Analysis of Transcriptome Dynamics Provides Novel Insights into Developmental State Transitions
Kristin Johnson, Simon Freedman, Rosemary Braun, Carole LaBonne

microCT scans of mouse embryos from Wilderman, et al.

A distant global control region is essential for normal expression of anterior HOXA genes during mouse and human craniofacial development
Andrea Wilderman, Eva D’haene, Machteld Baetens, Tara N. Yankee, Emma Wentworth Winchester, Nicole Glidden, Ellen Roets, Jo Van Dorpe, Sarah Vergult, Timothy C. Cox, Justin Cotney

ID1 and CEBPA Coordinate Epidermal Progenitor Cell Differentiation
Christina Geraldine Kantzer, Wei Yang, David Grommisch, Kim Vikhe Patil, Kylie Hin-Man Mak, Maria Genander

A cell cycle-dependent GARP-like transcriptional repressor regulates the initiation of differentiation in Giardia lamblia
Han-Wei Shih, Germain C.M. Alas, Alexander R. Paredez

Sox8 remodels the cranial ectoderm to generate the ear
Ailin Leticia Buzzi, Jingchen Chen, Alexandre Thiery, Julien Delile, Andrea Streit

DNA Double Strand Breaks cause chromosome loss through sister chromatid tethering in human embryos
Jenna Turocy, Diego Marin, Shuangyi Xu, Jia Xu, Alex Robles, Nathan Treff, Dieter Egli

A spatio-temporally constrained gene regulatory network directed by PBX1/2 acquires limb patterning specificity via HAND2
Marta Losa, Iros Barozzi, Marco Osterwalder, Peyman Zarrineh, Jean Denis Benazet, Brandon Chacon, Ausra Girdziusaite, Angela Morabito, Jianjian Zhu, Susan Mackem, Terence D. Capellini, Nicoletta Bobola, Diane Dickel, Aimee Zuniga, Axel Visel, Rolf Zeller, Licia Selleri

Lhx2 in germ cells suppresses endothelial cell migration in the developing ovary
Neha Singh, Domdatt Singh, Anshul Bhide, Richa Sharma, Sarthak Sahoo, Mohit Kumar Jolly, Deepak Modi

Timing of neurogenesis through sequential accumulation of miR-9 due to additive expression of multiple alleles
X. Soto, J. Burton, C. Manning, T. Minchington, R. Lea, J. Lee, J. Kursawe, M. Rattray, N. Papalopulu

SRSF10 is essential for progenitor spermatogonia expansion by regulating alternative splicing
Wenbo Liu, Xukun Lu, Zheng-Hui Zhao, Qian-Nan Li, Yue Xue, Zheng Gao, Si-Min Sun, Wen-Long Lei, Lei Li, Geng An, Hanyan Liu, Zhiming Han, Ying-Chun Ouyang, Yi Hou, Zhen-Bo Wang, Qing-Yuan Sun, Jianqiao Liu

The shifting epigenetic landscape and roles of key transcription factors during early retinal cell differentiation
Yichen Ge, Xushen Chen, Nan Nan, Jonathan Bard, Fuguo Wu, Donald Yergeau, Tao Liu, Jie Wang, Xiuqian Mu

Dynamic nucleosome organization after fertilization reveals regulatory factors for mouse zygotic genome activation
Chenfei Wang, Chuan Chen, Xiaoyu Liu, Chong Li, Qiu Wu, Xiaolan Chen, Lingyue Yang, Xiaochen Kou, Yanhong Zhao, Hong Wang, Yawei Gao, Yong Zhang, Shaorong Gao

The Grainyhead/LSF transcription factor GRH-1 is rhythmically required for molting
Milou W.M. Meeuse, Smita Nahar, Kathrin Braun, Helge Großhans

Histone H3 in C.elegans embryos from Gleason, et al.

Developmentally programmed epigenome regulates cellular plasticity at the parental-to-zygote transition
Ryan J. Gleason, Christopher S. Semancik, Gitanjali Lakshminarayanan, Xin Chen

A promoter-proximal silencer modifies the activity of a shared enhancer to mediate divergent expression of nub and pdm2 paralogs in wing development
Ryan Loker, Richard S. Mann

Nrf2 promotes thyroid development and hormone synthesis
Gillotay Pierre, Romitti Mirian, Dassy Benjamin, Haerlingen Benoit, Parakkal Shankar Meghna, Faria Fonseca Barbara, Ziros G. Panos, Pal Singh Sumeet, Sykiotis P. Gerasimos, Costagliola Sabine

microRNA-1 represses signaling pathway components to impact embryonic structures derived from all three germ layers
Nina Faye Sampilo, Jia L. Song

Induction and inhibition of Drosophila X chromosome gene expression are both impeded by the dosage compensation complex
Richard P. Meisel, Danial Asgari, Florencia Schlamp, Robert L. Unckless

Sperm mosaicism predicts transmission of de novo mutations to human blastocysts
Martin W. Breuss, Xiaoxu Yang, Valentina Stanley, Jennifer McEvoy-Venneri, Xin Xu, Arlene J. Morales, Joseph G. Gleeson

Genomic features underlie the co-option of SVA transposons as cis-regulatory elements in human pluripotent stem cells
Samantha M. Barnada, Andrew Isopi, Daniela Tejada-Martinez, Clément Goubert, Sruti Patoori, Luca Pagliaroli, Mason Tracewell, Marco Trizzino

Physoxia influences global and gene-specific methylation in pluripotent stem cells
Fatma Dogan, Rakad M Kh Aljumaily, Mark Kitchen, Nicholas R. Forsyth

LINE-1 retrotransposon activation intrinsic to interneuron development
Gabriela O. Bodea, Maria E. Ferreiro, Francisco J. Sanchez-Luque, Juan M. Botto, Jay Rasmussen, Muhammed A. Rahman, Laura R. Fenlon, Carolina Gubert, Patricia Gerdes, Liviu-Gabriel Bodea, Prabha Ajjikuttira, Peter Kozulin, Victor Billon, Santiago Morell, Marie-Jeanne H.C. Kempen, Chloe J. Love, Lucy M. Palmer, Adam D. Ewing, Dhanisha J. Jhaveri, Sandra R. Richardson, Anthony J. Hannan, Geoffrey J. Faulkner

Genome-wide binding of Drosophila Mask reveals its role in maintenance of gene activation by Trithorax group
Ammad Shaukat, Muhammad Haider Farooq Khan, Jawad Akhtar, Muhammad Abdul Haseeb, Khalida Mazhar, Zain Umer, Muhammad Tariq

Effects of somatic mutations on cellular differentiation in iPSC models of neurodevelopment
Pau Puigdevall, Julie Jerber, Petr Danecek, Sergi Castellano, Helena Kilpinen

TATTOO-seq delineates spatial and cell type-specific regulatory programs during limb patterning
Sébastien Bastide, Elad Chomsky, Baptiste Saudemont, Yann Loe-Mie, Sandrine Schmutz, Sophie Novault, Heather Marlow, Amos Tanay, François Spitz

| Stem cells, regeneration & disease modelling

Zfp503/Nlz2 is Required for RPE Differentiation and Optic Fissure Closure
Elangovan Boobalan, Amy H. Thompson, Ramakrishna P. Alur, David McGaughey, Lijin Dong, Grace Shih, Emile R. Vieta-Ferrer, Ighovie F. Onojafe, Vijay K. Kalaskar, Gavin Arno, Andrew J. Lotery, Bin Guan, Chelsea Bender, Omar Memon, Lauren Brinster, Clement Soleilhavoup, Lia Panman, Tudor C. Badea, Andrea Minella, Antonio Jacobo Lopez, Sara Thomasy, Ala Moshiri, Genomics England Research Consortium, Delphine Blain, Robert B. Hufnagel, Tiziana Cogliati, Kapil Bharti, Brian P. Brooks

Embryonic mouse hearts stained with hematoxylin and eosin from Chang, et al.

Dysregulated H19/Igf2 expression disrupts cardiac-placental axis during development of Silver Russell Syndrome-like mouse models
Suhee Chang, Diana Fulmer, Stella K. Hur, Joanne L. Thorvaldsen, Li Li, Yemin Lan, Eric A. Rhon-Calderon, Xiaowen Chen, Jonathan A. Epstein, Marisa S. Bartolomei

Gata2-regulated Gfi1b expression controls endothelial programming during endothelial-to-hematopoietic transition
Cansu Koyunlar, Emanuele Gioacchino, Disha Vadgama, Hans de Looper, Joke Zink, Remco Hoogenboezem, Marije Havermans, Eric Bindels, Elaine Dzierzak, Ivo P Touw, Emma de Pater

A nuclear receptor facilitates differentiation of human PSCs into more mature hepatocytes
Haiting Ma, Esmée de Zwaan, Yang Eric Guo, Paloma Cejas, Prathapan Thiru, Martijn van de Bunt, Jacob F. Jeppesen, Sudeepa Syamala, Alessandra Dall’Agnese, Brian J. Abraham, Dongdong Fu, Carrie Garrett-Engele, Tony Lee, Henry W Long, Linda G. Griffith, Richard A. Young, Rudolf Jaenisch

A Neurogenic Signature Involving Monoamine Oxidase-A controls Human Thermogenic Adipose Tissue Development
Javier Solivan-Rivera, Zinger Yang Loureiro, Tiffany DeSouza, Anand Desai, Qin Yang, Raziel Rojas-Rodriguez, Pantos Skritakis, Shannon Joyce, Denise Zhong, Tammy Nguyen, Silvia Corvera

Stem cells partner with matrix remodeling cells during regeneration
Blair W. Benham-Pyle, Frederick G. Mann Jr., Carolyn E. Brewster, Enya R. Dewars, Stephanie H. Nowotarski, Carlos Guerrero-Hernández, Seth Malloy, Kate E. Hall, Lucinda E. Maddera, Shiyuan Chen, Jason A. Morrison, Brian D. Slaughter, Anoja Perera, Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado

Stem cell homeostasis regulated by hierarchy and neutral competition
Asahi Nakamuta, Kana Yoshido, Honda Naoki

Single-cell analyses of axolotl forebrain organization, neurogenesis, and regeneration
Katharina Lust, Ashley Maynard, Tomás Gomes, Jonas Simon Fleck, J. Gray Camp, Elly M. Tanaka, Barbara Treutlein

Cfdp1 is Essential for Cardiac Development and Function
Giardoglou Panagiota, Deloukas Panos, Dedoussis George, Beis Dimitris

Altered patterning of trisomy 21 interneuron progenitors
Yathindar Giffin-Rao, Jie Sheng, Bennett Strand, Ke Xu, Leslie Huang, Margaret Medo, Kirstin A. Risgaard, Samuel Dantinne, Sruti Mohan, Aratrika Keshan, Roger A. Daley Jr., Bradley Levesque, Lindsey Amundson, Rebecca Reese, André M.M. Sousa, Yunlong Tao, Daifeng Wang, Su-Chun Zhang, Anita Bhattacharyya

Impact of Maternal Protein Restriction on Hypoxia-Inducible Factor (HIF) Expression in Male Fetal Kidney Development
Júlia Sevá Gomes, Letícia de Barros Sene, Gabriela Leme Lamana, Patricia Aline Boer, José Antônio Rocha Gontijo

VEGFR3 modulates brain microvessel branching in a mouse model of 22q11.2 deletion syndrome
Sara Cioffi, Gemma Flore, Stefania Martucciello, Marchesa Bilio, Maria Giuseppina Turturo, Elizabeth Illingworth

SARS-CoV-2 Can Infect Human Embryos
Mauricio Montano, Andrea R. Victor, Darren K. Griffin, Tommy Duong, Nathalie Bolduc, Andrew Farmer, Vidur Garg, Anna-Katerina Hadjantonakis, Alison Coates, Frank L. Barnes, Christo G. Zouves, Warner C. Greene, Manuel Viotti

Fgf8 dosage regulates jaw shape and symmetry through pharyngeal-cardiac tissue relationships
Nathaniel Zbasnik, Katie Dolan, Stephanie A. Buczkowski, Rebecca Green, Benedikt Hallgrimsson, Ralph S. Marcucio, Anne M. Moon, Jennifer L. Fish

En1 and Lmx1b do not recapitulate embryonic dorsal-ventral limb patterning functions during mouse digit tip regeneration
Gemma L. Johnson, Morgan B. Glasser, Julia F. Charles, Jeffrey Duryea, Jessica A. Lehoczky

Mouse and human blastocyts from Yang, et al.

Differential expression of Nanog 3UTR and coding region mRNA components defines an embryonic stem cell niche
Ze Yang, Shaoyi Ji, Leonardi Gozali, Mujib Ullah, Sophie Parsa, Barry Behr, Mary A. Hynes

Uterine injury during diestrus leads to embryo spacing defects and perturbations in the COX pathway in subsequent pregnancies
Elisa T. Zhang, Kristen L. Wells, Lars Steinmetz, Julie C. Baker

“Integration of multimodal data in the developing tooth reveals candidate dental disease genes”
Emma Wentworth Winchester, Alexis Hardy, Justin Cotney

A critical role for heme synthesis and succinate in the regulation of pluripotent states transitions
Damien Detraux, Marino Caruso, Louise Feller, Maude Fransolet, Sébastien Meurant, Julie Mathieu, Thierry Arnould, Patricia Renard

Quality assurance of hematopoietic stem cells by macrophages determines stem cell clonality
Samuel J. Wattrus, Mackenzie L. Smith, Cecilia Pessoa Rodrigues, Elliott J. Hagedorn, Bogdan Budnik, Leonard I. Zon

Ependymal cell maturation is heterogeneous and ongoing in the mouse spinal cord and dynamically regulated in response to injury
Aida Rodrigo Albors, Gail A. Singer, Andrew P. May, Chris P. Ponting, Kate G. Storey

Elevated p21 (CDKN1a) mediates β-thalassemia erythroid apoptosis but its loss does not improve β-thalassemic erythropoiesis
Vijay Menon, Miao Lin, Raymond Liang, Tasleem Arif, Anagha Menon, Laura Breda, Stefano Rivella, Saghi Ghaffari

Proteomic Profiling of Hypoplastic Lungs Suggests an Underlying Inflammatory Response in the Pathogenesis of Abnormal Lung Development in Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia
Richard Wagner, Paula Lieckfeldt, Hadeesha Piyadasa, Moritz Markel, Jan Riedel, Camelia Stefanovici, Nicole Peukert, Daywin Patel, Gabrielle Derraugh, Suyin Lum Min, Jan-Hendrik Gosemann, Jan Deprest, Christopher D. Pascoe, Andrew Tse, Martin Lacher, Neeloffer Mookherjee, Richard Keijzer

Inflammatory response in hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells triggered by activating SHP2 mutations evokes blood defects
Maja Solman, Sasja Blokzijl-Franke, Florian Piques, Chuan Yan, Qiqi Yang, Marion Strullu, Sarah M. Kamel, Pakize Ak, Jeroen Bakkers, David M. Langenau, Hélène Cavé, Jeroen den Hertog

Planarians and their heterotrimeric G proteins from Jenkins and Roberts-Galbraith

Heterotrimeric G proteins regulate planarian regeneration and behavior
Jennifer E. Jenkins, Rachel H. Roberts-Galbraith

FAM172A controls the nuclear import and alternative splicing function of AGO2
Sephora Sallis, Félix-Antoine Bérubé-Simard, Benoit Grondin, Elizabeth Leduc, Fatiha Azouz, Catherine Bélanger, Nicolas Pilon

Snrpb, the CCMS gene, is required in neural crest cells for proper splicing of genes essential for craniofacial morphogenesis
Sabrina Shameen Alam, Shruti Kumar, Marie-Claude Beauchamp, Eric Bareke, Alexia Boucher, Nadine Nzirorera, Reinnier Padilla, Si Jing Zhang, Jacek Majewski, Loydie A. Jerome-Majewska

Neovascularization and the recruitment of CD31+ cells from the bone marrow are unique under regenerative but not wound repair conditions
Kamila Bedelbaeva, Young Zhang, Azamat Azlanukov, Dmitri Gourevitch, Iossif Strehin, Phillip Messersmith, Ellen Heber-Katz

Alcam-a and Pdgfr-α are essential for the development of sclerotome derived stromal cells that support hematopoiesis in vivo
Emi Murayama, Catherine Vivier, Anne Schmidt, Anne-Lou Touret, Philippe Herbomel

The extracellular matrix fibulin 7 maintains epidermal stem cell heterogeneity during skin aging
Erna Raja, Gopakumar Changarathil, Lalhaba Oinam, Yen Xuan Ngo, Jun Tsunezumi, Ryutaro Ishii, Takako Sasaki, Kyoko Imanaka-Yoshida, Hiromi Yanagisawa, Aiko Sada

Integrative analysis of transcriptomics in human craniofacial development reveals novel candidate disease genes
Tara N. Yankee, Andrea Wilderman, Emma Wentworth Winchester, Jennifer VanOudenhove, Justin Cotney

A cell cycle-linked mechanism for the glutamine driven establishment of stem cell fate
Michael Xiao, Chia-Hua Wu, Graham Meek, Brian Kelly, Lyndsay E.A. Young, Sara Martire, Dara Buendia Castillo, Purbita Saha, Altair L. Dube, Matthew S. Gentry, Laura A. Banaszynski, Ramon C. Sun, Chintan K. Kikani

Dual specificity phosphatase 7 drives the formation of cardiac mesoderm in mouse embryonic stem cells
Stanislava Sladeček, Katarzyna Anna Radaszkiewicz, Martina Bőhmová, Tomáš Gybeľ, Tomasz Witold Radaszkiewicz, Jiří Pacherník

| Plant development

Cell-based model shows complex rearrangement of tissue mechanical properties are needed for roots to grow in hard soil
Matthias Mimault, Mariya Ptashnyk, Lionel Dupuy

Transcriptome profiling of barley and tomato shoot and root meristems unravels physiological variations underlying photoperiodic sensitivity
Michael Schneider, Lucia Vedder, Benedict Chijioke Oyiga, Boby Mathew, Heiko Schoof, Jens Léon, Ali Ahmad Naz

Dopamine pathway characterization during the reproductive mode switch in the pea aphid
Gaël Le Trionnaire, Sylvie Hudaverdian, Gautier Richard, Sylvie Tanguy, Florence Gleonnec, Nathalie Prunier-Leterme, Jean-Pierre Gauthier, Denis Tagu

Redundant PLETHORA activity promotes development of early embryonic cell lineages in Arabidopsis
Merijn Kerstens, Carla Galinha, Hugo Hofhuis, Michael Nodine, Ben Scheres, Viola Willemsen

14 day old Arabidopsis seedlings from Stitz, et al.

TOR acts as metabolic gatekeeper for auxin-dependent lateral root initiation in Arabidopsis thaliana
Michael Stitz, David Kuster, Maximilian Reinert, Mikhail Schepetilnikov, Béatrice Berthet, Denis Janocha, Anthony Artins, Marc Boix, Rossana Henriques, Anne Pfeiffer, Jan Lohmann, Emmanuel Gaquerel, Alexis Maizel

Complex developmental and transcriptional dynamics underlie pollinator-driven evolutionary transitions in nectar spur morphology in Aquilegia (columbine)
Molly B. Edwards, Evangeline S. Ballerini, Elena M. Kramer

Liguleless narrow and narrow odd dwarf act in overlapping pathways to regulate maize development & physiology
María Jazmín Abraham-Juárez, Michael Busche, Alyssa A. Anderson, China Lunde, Jeremy Winders, Shawn A. Christensen, Charles T. Hunter, Sarah Hake, Jacob O. Brunkard

The DC1 domain protein BINUCLEATE POLLEN is required for pollen development in Arabidopsis
Leonardo Agustín Arias, Sebastián D’Ippolito, Jésica Frik, Natalia Loreley Amigo, Claudia Anahí Casalongué, Gabriela Carolina Pagnussat, Diego Fernando Fiol

Phyllochron duration and changes through rice development shape the vertical leaf size profile
Janet P. Pablo, Benoit Clerget, Crisanta Bueno, Jacqueline Dionora, Abigail J. Domingo, Constancio C. De Guzman, Edna A. Aguilar, Nina M. Cadiz, Pompe C. Sta Cruz

The NIN-LIKE PROTEIN 7 (NLP7) transcription factor modulates auxin pathways to regulate root cap development
Narender Kumar, Chloe Caldwell, Anjali S. Iyer-Pascuzzi

MYB12 spatiotemporally represses TMO5/LHW-mediated transcription in the Arabidopsis root meristem
Brecht Wybouw, Helena E. Arents, Baojun Yang, Jonah Nolf, Wouter Smet, Michael Vandorpe, Daniël Van Damme, Matouš Glanc, Bert De Rybel

Stem cell regulators control a G1 duration gradient in the plant root meristem
Clara Echevarria, Bénédicte Desvoyes, Marco Marconi, José Manuel Franco-Zorrila, Laura Lee, Masaaki Umeda, Robert Sablowski, Kenneth D. Birnbaum, Krzysztof Wabnik, Crisanto Gutierrez

An environmentally-responsive transcriptional state modulates cell identities during root development
Marina Oliva, Tim Stuart, Dave Tang, Jahnvi Pflueger, Daniel Poppe, Jafar S. Jabbari, Scott Gigante, Jonathan Michael Dragwidge, James Whelan, Mathew G. Lewsey, Ryan Lister

| Evo-devo

Developmental timing of Drosophila pachea pupae is robust to temperature changes
Bénédicte M. Lefèvre, Stecy Mienanzambi, Michael Lang

Wildtype Parhyale hatchling from Sun, et al.

Distinct regulation of Hox genes by Polycomb Group genes in a crustacean
Dennis A Sun, Yuri Takahashi, Rebecca J Chang, Nipam H Patel

Gill developmental program in the teleost mandibular arch
Mathi Thiruppathy, J. Andrew Gillis, J. Gage Crump

Sea anemone Frizzled receptors play partially redundant roles in the oral-aboral axis patterning
Isabell Niedermoser, Tatiana Lebedeva, Grigory Genikhovich

Recent reconfiguration of an ancient developmental gene regulatory network in Heliocidaris sea urchins
Phillip L Davidson, Haobing Guo, Jane S Swart, Abdull J Massri, Allison Edgar, Lingyu Wang, Alejandro Berrio, Hannah R Devens, Demian Koop, Paula Cisternas, He Zhang, Yaolei Zhang, Maria Byrne, Guangyi Fan, Gregory A Wray

The conserved transcriptional program of metazoan male germ cells uncovers ancient origins of human infertility
Rion Brattig Correia, Joana M. Almeida, Margot J. Wyrwoll, Irene Julca, Daniel Sobral, Chandra Shekhar Misra, Leonardo G. Guilgur, Hans-Christian Schuppe, Neide Silva, Pedro Prudêncio, Ana Nóvoa, Ana S. Leocádio, Joana Bom, Moisés Mallo, Sabine Kliesch, Marek Mutwil, Luis M. Rocha, Frank Tüttelmann, Jörg D. Becker, Paulo Navarro-Costa

Ultrabithorax modifies a regulatory network of genes essential for butterfly eyespot development in a wing sector-specific manner
Yuji Matsuoka, Antónia Monteiro

Distal-less and spalt are distal organisers of pierid wing patterns
Jocelyn Liang Qi Wee, Tirtha Das Banerjee, Anupama Prakash, Kwi Shan Seah, Antónia Monteiro

Cell Biology

Ubiquitin ligases and a processive proteasome facilitate protein clearance during the oocyte-to-embryo transition in Caenorhabditis elegans
Caroline A. Spike, Tatsuya Tsukamoto, David Greenstein

SPACA6 structure reveals a conserved superfamily of gamete fusion-associated proteins
Tyler D.R. Vance, Patrick Yip, Elisabet Jiménez, Sheng Li, Diana Gawol, James Byrnes, Isabel Usón, Ahmed Ziyyat, Jeffrey E. Lee

Endothelial-derived sphingolipids are required for vascular development and systemic lipid homeostasis
Andrew Kuo, Antonio Checa, Colin Niaudet, Bongnam Jung, Zhongjie Fu, Craig E. Wheelock, Sasha A. Singh, Masanori Aikawa, Lois E. Smith, Richard L. Proia, Timothy Hla

Simultaneous suppression of ribosome biogenesis and Tor activation by TRIM-NHL proteins promotes terminal differentiation
Jinghua Gui, Tamsin J Samuels, Katarina ZA Grobicki, Felipe Karam Teixeira

Proteasomal subunit depletions differentially affect germline integrity in C. elegans
Lourds Michelle Fernando, Cristina Quesada-Candela, Makaelah Murray, Caroline Ugoaru, Judith L. Yanowitz, Anna K. Allen

STAT3 and HIF1α cooperatively mediate the transcriptional and physiological responses to hypoxia
Alberto Dinarello, Riccardo Massimiliano Betto, Linda Diamante, Chiara Cioccarelli, Giacomo Meneghetti, Margherita Peron, Annachiara Tesoriere, Claudio Laquatra, Natascia Tiso, Graziano Martello, Francesco Argenton

The X chromosome is a potential polarising signal for asymmetric cell divisions in meiotic cells of a nematode
Talal Alyazeedi, Emily Xu, Jasmin Kaur, Diane Shakes, Andre Pires-daSilva

Crumbs complex-directed apical membrane dynamics in epithelial cell ingression
Sérgio Simões, Gerald Lerchbaumer, Milena Pellikka, Paraskevi Giannatou, Thomas Lam, Dohyun Kim, Jessica Yu, David ter Stal, Kenana Al Kakouni, Rodrigo Fernandez-Gonzalez, Ulrich Tepass

Microtubules control Buc Phase separation and Balbiani body condensation in zebrafish oocyte polarity
Rachael Deis, Yaniv M. Elkouby

Cilia regulate meiotic recombination in zebrafish
Haibo Xie, Xiaosi Wang, Minjun Jin, Lanqin Li, Junwen Zhu, Yunsi Kang, Zhe Chen, Yonghua Sun, Chengtian Zhao

Kymographs of migrating cells in Drosophila egg chambers from Williams, et al.

Fat2 polarizes the WAVE complex in trans to align cell protrusions for collective migration
Audrey M. Williams, Seth Donoughe, Edwin Munro, Sally Horne-Badovinac

A Pluripotent Developmental State Confers a Low Fidelity of Chromosome Segregation
Chenhui Deng, Amanda Ya, Duane A. Compton, Kristina M. Godek

Cell-intrinsic differences between human airway epithelial cells from children and adults
Elizabeth F. Maughan, Robert E. Hynds, Adam Pennycuick, Ersilia Nigro, Kate H.C. Gowers, Celine Denais, Sandra Gómez-López, Kyren A. Lazarus, Jessica C. Orr, David R. Pearce, Sarah E. Clarke, Dani Do Hyang Lee, Maximillian N. J. Woodall, Tereza Masonou, Katie-Marie Case, Vitor H. Teixeira, Benjamin E. Hartley, Richard J. Hewitt, Chadwan Al Yaghchi, Gurpreet S. Sandhu, Martin A. Birchall, Christopher O’Callaghan, Claire M. Smith, Paolo De Coppi, Colin R. Butler, Sam M. Janes

“Two-story building” of a ctenophore comb plate provides structural and functional integrity for motility of giant multicilia
Kei Jokura, Yu Sato, Kogiku Shiba, Kazuo Inaba

Mother cells control daughter cell proliferation in intestinal organoids to minimize proliferation fluctuations
Guizela Huelsz-Prince, Rutger N.U. Kok, Yvonne J. Goos, Lotte Bruens, Xuan Zheng, Saskia I. Ellenbroek, Jacco van Rheenen, Sander J. Tans, Jeroen S. van Zon

Induction of cortical Par complex polarity by designed proteins causes cytoskeletal symmetry breaking in unpolarized mammalian cells
Joseph L. Watson, Ariel J. Ben-Sasson, Alice Bittleston, James D. Manton, David Baker, Emmanuel Derivery

Lnc956-TRIM28-HSP90B1 complex on replication forks promotes CMG helicase retention to ensure stem cell genomic stability and embryogenesis
Weidao Zhang, Min Tang, Lin Wang, Hu Zhou, Jing Gao, Zhongliang Chen, Bo Zhao, Ping Zheng

Lrig3 restricts the size of the colon stem cell compartment
Janelle G. Stevenson, Ryan Sayegh, Natalie Pedicino, Natalie A. Pellitier, Tim Wheeler, Matthew E. Bechard, Won Jae Huh, Robert J. Coffey, Anne E. Zemper

Modelling

Modelling embryogenesis in Arabidopsis thaliana from Laruelle, et al.

Large-scale analysis and computer modeling reveal hidden regularities behind variability of cell division patterns in Arabidopsis thaliana embryogenesis
Elise Laruelle, Katia Belcram, Alain Trubuil, Jean-Christophe Palauqui, Philippe Andrey

A constraints-based theory of the primary cause of senescence: imbalance of epigenetic and non-epigenetic information in histone crosstalk
Felipe A. Veloso

Universal dynamics of biological pattern formation in spatio-temporal morphogen variations
Mohit P. Dalwadi, Philip Pearce

Stability of asymmetric cell division under confinement: A deformable cell model of cytokinesis applied to C. elegans development
Maxim Cuvelier, Wim Thiels, Rob Jelier, Bart Smeets

Minimizing cell number fluctuations in self-renewing tissues with a stem cell niche
Rutger N.U. Kok, Sander J. Tans, Jeroen S. van Zon

Cellular compartmentalisation and receptor promiscuity as a strategy for accurate and robust inference of position during morphogenesis
Krishnan S Iyer, Madan Rao, Chaitra Prabhakara, Satyajit Mayor

Modelling mechanically dominated vasculature development
Benjamin J. Walker, Adriana T. Dawes

A mathematical modelling portrait of Wnt signalling in early vertebrate embryogenesis
Claudiu V. Giuraniuc, Shabana Zain, Shahmama Ghafoor, Stefan Hoppler

Reviews

Genetic Regulation of Central Synapse Formation and Organization in Drosophila melanogaster
Juan Carlos Duhart and Timothy J. Mosca

Pluripotent Core in Bovine Embryos: A Review
Luis Aguila, Claudia Osycka-Salut, Favian Treulen , Ricardo Felmer

Tools & Resources

SyNPL: Synthetic Notch pluripotent cell lines to monitor and manipulate cell interactions in vitro and in vivo
Mattias Malaguti, Rosa Portero Migueles, Jennifer Annoh, Daina Sadurska, Guillaume Blin, Sally Lowell

Recently hatched Loligo vulgaris from Duruz, et al.

Molecular characterization of cell types in the squid Loligo vulgaris
Jules Duruz, Marta Sprecher, Jenifer C. Kaldun, Alsayed Alsoudy, Heidi Tschanz-Lischer, Geert van Geest, Pamela Nicholson, Rémy Bruggmann, Simon G. Sprecher

siRNA-mediated gene knockdown via electroporation in hydrozoan jellyfish embryos
Tokiha Masuda-Ozawa, Sosuke Fujita, Ryotaro Nakamura, Hiroshi Watanabe, Erina Kuranaga, Yu-ichiro Nakajima

Scalable Generation of Pseudo-Unipolar Sensory Neurons from Human Pluripotent Stem Cells
Tao Deng, Carlos A. Tristan, Claire Weber, Pei-Hsuan Chu, Seungmi Ryu, Vukasin M. Jovanovic, Pinar Ormanoglu, Prisca Twumasi, Jaehoon Shim, Selwyn Jayakar, Han-Xiong Bear Zhang, Sooyeon Jo, Ty C. Voss, Anton Simeonov, Bruce P. Bean, Clifford J. Woolf, Ilyas Singeç

A cellular and molecular analysis of SoxB-driven neurogenesis in a cnidarian
Eleni Chrysostomou, Hakima Flici, Sebastian G Gornik, Miguel Salinas-Saavedra, James M Gahan, Emma T McMahon, Kerry Thompson, Shirley Hanley, Michelle Kilcoyne, Christine E. Schnitzler, Paul Gonzalez, Andreas D Baxevanis, Uri Frank

Enhancing the Fitness of Embryoid Bodies and Organoids by Chemical Cytoprotection
Seungmi Ryu, Claire Weber, Pei-Hsuan Chu, Carlos A. Tristan, Ben Ernest, Vukasin M. Jovanovic, Tao Deng, Jaroslav Slamecka, Hyenjong Hong, John Braisted, Marissa Hirst, Anton Simeonov, Ty C. Voss, Ilyas Singeç

From neural border to migratory stage: A comprehensive single cell roadmap of the timing and regulatory logic driving cranial and vagal neural crest emergence
Aleksandr Kotov, Mansour Alkobtawi, Subham Seal, Vincent Kappès, Sofia Medina Ruiz, Hugo Arbès, Richard Harland, Leonid Peshkin, Anne H. Monsoro-Burq

Mechanisms underlying the reprogramming of mouse embryonic fibroblasts to thymic epithelial cells
Zhongyao Ma, Seung Woo Kang, Brian G. Condie, Nancy R. Manley

Molecular characterization of a flatworm Girardia isolate from Guanajuato, Mexico
Elizabeth M. Duncan, Stephanie H. Nowotarski, Carlos Guerrero-Hernández, Eric J. Ross, Julia A. D’Orazio, Clubes de Ciencia México Workshop for Developmental Biology, Sean McKinney, Mark C. McHargue, Longhua Guo, Melainia McClain, Alejandro Sánchez Alvarado

Organoids from Rahman, et al.

Local actuation of organoids by magnetic nanoparticles
Abdel Rahman Abdel Fattah, Niko Kolaitis, Katrien Van Daele, Andika Gregorius Rustandi, Adrian Ranga

Identification of fetal liver stroma in spectral cytometry using the parameter autofluorescence
Marcia Mesquita Peixoto, Francisca Soares-da-Silva, Sandrine Schmutz, Marie-Pierre Mailhe, Sophie Novault, Ana Cumano, Cedric Ait-Mansour

Single-cell atlas of human liver development reveals pathways directing hepatic cell fates
Brandon T. Wesley, Alexander D. B. Ross, Daniele Muraro, Zhichao Miao, Sarah Saxton, Rute A. Tomaz, Carola M. Morell, Katherine Ridley, Ekaterini D. Zacharis, Sandra Petrus-Reurer, Judith Kraiczy, Krishnaa T. Mahbubani, Stephanie Brown, Jose Garcia-Bernardo, Clara Alsinet, Daniel Gaffney, Olivia C. Tysoe, Rachel A. Botting, Emily Stephenson, Dorin-Mirel Popescu, Sonya MacParland, Gary Bader, Ian D. McGilvray, Daniel Ortmann, Fotios Sampaziotis, Kourosh Saeb-Parsy, Muzlifah Haniffa, Kelly R. Stevens, Matthias Zilbauer, Sarah A. Teichmann, Ludovic Vallier

A guide to examining intramuscular fat formation and its cellular origin in skeletal muscle
Connor D. Johnson, Lylybell Y. Zhou, Daniel Kopinke

Temporal and spatial dynamics mapping reveals follicle development regulated by different stromal cell populations
Xiaoqiang Sheng, Jidong Zhou, Nannan Kang, Wenwen Liu, Lina Yu, Zhe Zhang, Yang Zhang, Qiuling Yue, Qiwen Yang, Xinke Zhang, Chaojun Li, Guijun Yan, Haixiang Sun

In vivo assessment of mechanical properties during axolotl development and regeneration using confocal Brillouin microscopy
Camilo Riquelme-Guzmán, Timon Beck, Sandra Edwards-Jorquera, Raimund Schlüßler, Paul Müller, Jochen Guck, Stephanie Möllmert, Tatiana Sandoval-Guzmán

Highly efficient generation of blastocyst-like structures from mouse totipotent blastomere-like cells
Pengfei Zhang, Xuzhao Zhai, Boyan Huang, Shu Sun, WenJing Wang, Man Zhang

Antiviral and Neuroprotective Abilities of Influenza Virus Infection in Tractable Brain Organoids
Xiaodong Zhang, Haishuang Lin, Liangzhen Dong, Qing Xia

Major transcriptomic, epigenetic and metabolic changes underly the pluripotency continuum in rabbit preimplantation embryos
Wilhelm Bouchereau, Luc Jouneau, Catherine Archilla, Irène Aksoy, Anais Moulin, Nathalie Daniel, Nathalie Peynot, Sophie Calderari, Thierry Joly, Murielle Godet, Yan Jaszczyszyn, Marine Pratlong, Dany Severac, Pierre Savatier, Véronique Duranthon, Marielle Afanassieff, Nathalie Beaujean

The Digital 3D-Atlas MAKER (DAMAKER): a dynamic and expandable digital 3D-tool for monitoring the temporal changes in tissue growth during hindbrain morphogenesis
Matthias Blanc, Frederic Udina, Cristina Pujades

An Open-source, Cost-Efficient Excitation Module for Single-molecule Microscopy
Dylan R. George, Benjamin Ambrose, Ashley J. Cadby, Timothy D. Craggs

SCExecute: cell barcode-stratified analyses of scRNA-seq data
Nathan Edwards, Christian Dillard, NM Prashant, Hongyu Liu, Mia Yang, Evgenia Ulianova, Anelia Horvath

SpyChIP identifies cell type-specific transcription factor occupancy from complex tissues
Siqian Feng, Richard S. Mann

Development of a Novel Microfluidic Co-culture model to study Organoid Vascularization
Lydia S. Schulla, E. Diana Alupoaie, Leanne De Silva, Debby Gawlitta, Sabine Middendorp, Paul J. Coffer, M. Guy Roukens

Endometriotic Organoids: A Novel In Vitro Model of Endometriotic Lesion Development
Yong Song, Gregory W. Burns, Niraj R. Joshi, Ripla Arora, J. Julie Kim, Asgerally T. Fazleabas

A Single Cell Cloning Platform for Gene Edited Functional Murine Hematopoietic Stem Cells
Hans Jiro Becker, Reiko Ishida, Adam C. Wilkinson, Takaharu Kimura, Michelle Sue Jann Lee, Cevayir Coban, Yasunori Ota, Arinobu Tojo, David Kent, Satoshi Yamazaki

Mouse intestine from Battistella, et al.

Light-sheet mesoscopy with the Mesolens provides fast sub-cellular resolution imaging throughout large tissue volumes
Eliana Battistella, Jan Schniete, Katrina Wesencraft, Juan Quintana, Gail McConnell

A microfluidic platform to investigate the role of mechanical constraints on tissue reorganization
Sham Tlili, François Graner, Hélène Delanoë-Ayari

Multimodal spatiotemporal phenotyping of human organoid development
Philipp Wahle, Giovanna Brancati, Christoph Harmel, Zhisong He, Gabriele Gut, Aline Santos, Qianhui Yu, Pascal Noser, Jonas Simon Fleck, Bruno Gjeta, Dinko Pavlinić, Simone Picelli, Maximilian Hess, Gregor Schmidt, Tom Lummen, Yanyan Hou, Patricia Galliker, Magdalena Renner, Lucas Pelkmans, Barbara Treutlein, J. Gray Camp

Comparison of CRISPR/Cas9-mediated megabase-scale genome deletion methods in mouse embryonic stem cells
Masayuki Miyata, Junko Yoshida, Itsuki Takagishi, Kyoji Horie

An integrated cell atlas of the human lung in health and disease
L Sikkema, D Strobl, L Zappia, E Madissoon, NS Markov, L Zaragosi, M Ansari, M Arguel, L Apperloo, C Bécavin, M Berg, E Chichelnitskiy, M Chung, A Collin, ACA Gay, B Hooshiar Kashani, M Jain, T Kapellos, TM Kole, C Mayr, M von Papen, L Peter, C Ramírez-Suástegui, J Schniering, C Taylor, T Walzthoeni, C Xu, LT Bui, C de Donno, L Dony, M Guo, AJ Gutierrez, L Heumos, N Huang, I Ibarra, N Jackson, P Kadur Lakshminarasimha Murthy, M Lotfollahi, T Tabib, C Talavera-Lopez, K Travaglini, A Wilbrey-Clark, KB Worlock, M Yoshida, Lung Biological Network Consortium, T Desai, O Eickelberg, C Falk, N Kaminski, M Krasnow, R Lafyatis, M Nikolíc, J Powell, J Rajagopal, O Rozenblatt-Rosen, MA Seibold, D Sheppard, D Shepherd, SA Teichmann, A Tsankov, J Whitsett, Y Xu, NE Banovich, P Barbry, TE Duong, KB Meyer, JA Kropski, D Pe’er, HB Schiller, PR Tata, JL Schultze, AV Misharin, MC Nawijn, MD Luecken, F Theis

Epithelial monolayer development and tight junction assembly on nanopillar arrays
Jose Yeste, Xavi Illa, Nitesh Shashikanth, Anton Guimerà-Brunet, Rosa Villa, Jerrold R Turner

Generation and Maturation of Human iPSC-derived Cardiac Organoids in Long Term Culture
Ece Ergir, Jorge Oliver-De La Cruz, Soraia Fernandes, Marco Cassani, Francesco Niro, Daniel Sousa, Jan Vrbský, Vladimír Vinarský, Ana Rubina Perestrelo, Doriana Debellis, Francesca Cavalieri, Stefania Pagliari, Heinz Redl, Peter Ertl, Giancarlo Forte

The Tabula Sapiens: a multiple organ single cell transcriptomic atlas of humans
The Tabula Sapiens Consortium, Stephen R Quake

Research practice & education

PhD and postdoc training outcomes at EMBL: changing career paths for life scientists in Europe
Junyan Lu, Britta Velten, Bernd Klaus, Mauricio Ramm, Wolfgang Huber, Rachel Coulthard-Graf

Animal-reliance bias in publishing is a potential barrier to scientific progress
Catharine E. Krebs, Ann Lam, Janine McCarthy, Helder Constantino, Kristie Sullivan

The gender gap in academic career achievements and the mediation effect of work-family conflict and partner support
Xiang Zheng, Haimiao Yuan, Chaoqun Ni

Hybrid conferences: opportunities, challenges and ways forward
Eleonora Puccinelli, Daniela Zeppilli, Paris Stefanoudis, Annaïg Wittische-Helou, Marjorie Kermorgant, Sandra Fuchs, Jozée Sarrazin, Erin E. Easton, Alexandra Anh-Thu Weber

Analysis of science journalism reveals gender and regional disparities in coverage
Natalie R. Davidson, Casey S. Greene

If this title is funny, will you cite me? Citation impacts of humour and other features of article titles in ecology and evolution
Stephen B. Heard, Chloe A. Cull, Easton R. White

An approachable, flexible, and practical machine learning workshop for biologists
Chris S Magnano, Fangzhou Mu, Rosemary S Russ, Milica Cvetkovic, Debora Treu, Anthony Gitter

Replacing bar graphs of continuous data with more informative graphics: Are we making progress?
Nico Riedel, Robert Schulz, Vartan Kazezian, Tracey Weissgerber

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Genetics Unzipped: Face to face – the viruses that made us human

Posted by , on 7 April 2022

Image licensed from Envato

In the latest episode of the Genetics Unzipped podcast, we’re looking at the monkey in the mirror, investigating how flipped genetic switches and long-dead viruses make all the difference between our human faces and those of our closest primate relatives.

“The bits in our genome that encode functional elements like proteins are pretty much identical to a chimp’s. But straight away you can see that a chimp’s face is very different from our own, even though it’s made using the same biological ingredients.”

Dr Kat Arney, presenter

Genetics Unzipped is the podcast from The Genetics Society. Full transcript, links and references available online at GeneticsUnzipped.com.

Subscribe from Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Head over to GeneticsUnzipped.com to catch up on our extensive 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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Cell Bio 2022-An ASCB|EMBO Meeting

Posted by , on 6 April 2022

December 3-7, 2022 | Walter E. Washington Convention Center | Washington, DC

Returning in person in 2022—this mid-sized unique joint meeting of the American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) and the European Molecular Biology Organisation (EMBO) focuses on cell biology as the fundamental basis of biology, while also offering sessions on emerging interdisciplinary topics.

Besides offering attendees opportunities to present their research, the meeting provides an unparalleled forum for attendees to network and initiate collaborations across disciplines. Cell Bio 2022 offers eight different tracks—seven scientific and one covering educational, professional development, diversity, and inclusion.

Website: ascb.org/cellbio2022

Abstract Talk Deadline: August 2, 2022

Early Registration Deadline: September 30, 2022

Final Abstract Deadline (Poster only): October 12, 2022

For More info contact ascbinfo@ascb.org.

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New Book: Emerging Model Systems in Developmental Biology

Posted by , on 1 April 2022

Mansi Srivastava and I have edited a new book that’s packed with scientists’ stories about emerging model organisms. The book presents some interesting additions to the core set of model organisms, with contributions from people who have developed new model systems or advanced tools for emerging models. And it includes personal stories about how and why model systems were developed. The book isn’t comprehensive – we look forward to reading other scientists’ stories about these and other emerging models. But if you’re looking for 700+ pages of fascinating biology, we encourage you to take a look!

Emerging Model Systems in Developmental Biology

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Categories: News, Resources

PhD project: Multi-scale computational analysis of embryonic variability in ascidians

Posted by , on 1 April 2022

Closing Date: 11 May 2022

A PhD project proposal to be carried out in Patrick Lemaire’s lab at CRBM, Montpellier, France, in tight collaboration with Grégoire Malandain, Morpheme INRIA team, Sophia-Antipolis, France. Funding is conditional upon selection by the CBS2 doctoral school‘s entrance jury.

Why study ascidians?

The embryonic development of ascidians, a group of marine invertebrates, is remarkably conserved, at the single cell level, between individuals of a given species and between species, even if they diverged up to 400 MY ago.  Ascidian genomes, however, evolve particularly rapidly. The remarkably simple and transparent ascidian embryos are thus ideal to study developmental systems drift and to identify constraints that could explain the exceptional evolutionary precision and stability of embryonic morphologies.

The proposed project

We propose a computational PhD project, which will use experimental data collected in the team or in public databases to characterise inter-individual and inter-species variability at the geometric, mechanical and transcriptional scales.

This project will involve the development of concepts and computer tools to study and measure, at each scale studied, the variability of different parameters (variability of cell lineages, cell lifetimes, orientation of cell division, pressures, surface and line tensions, gene expression, etc.). These studies will lead to a reflection on the concept of the average embryo and on its computational representation. The tools developed will open the way to the quantitative study of robustness to environmental and genetic perturbations, and to the identification of bridges between scales of analysis (search for co-varying parameters across scales).

What is available to start the project?

The project will benefit from the conceptual and methodological developments made over the last 10 years by the hosting teams and their collaborators (see references below). These breakthroughs (ASTEC, MorphoNet, Aniseed) place them in a unique position to analyse, experimentally and computationally, the variability of animal embryogenesis, whether natural or in response to environmental or experimental perturbations.

Using these advanced tools, we generated high resolution geometric and mechanical descriptions of 7 embryos of the ascidian Phallusia mammillata, over several hours of development and with a 2 minutes time resolution. You can view a short video highlighting this works.

These embryos and tools constitute a solid basis for the proposed PhD project. The embryo collection is currently expanding to include more WT Phallusia embryos as well as embryos cultured in response to environmental (temperature, salinity, pH) or genetic perturbations.

How to apply?

The ideal candidate will have successfully graduated from a Master’s programme in computer science, bioinformatics or physics recognized by France. S/He will have strong computational skills and some knowledge of developmental biology. A working knowledge of English (B2) is needed. There is no prerequisite in French.

To apply to the project, please contact P. Lemaire (patrick.lemaire[at]crbm.cnrs.fr) as soon as possible and by May 11, 2022 at the latest with a motivation letter, a CV and the names and contact details of 2 academic referees including the PhD supervisor.

References

Guignard L. *, Fiuza U.-M. *, Leggio B., Laussu J., Faure E., Michelin G., Biasuz K., Hufnagel L., Malandain G. #, Godin C. #, Lemaire P.# (2020) Contact-area dependent cell communications and the morphological invariance of ascidian embryogenesis. Science, 369 :6500 eaar5663

Dardaillon, J; Dauga, D; …; Dantec, C.#; Lemaire, P#. (2019) ANISEED 2019: 4D exploration of genetic data for an extended range of tunicates. Nucleic Acids Res. 48(D1): D668-D675

Leggio, B; Laussu J; Carlier, A; Godin, C; Lemaire, P and Faure, E (2019) MorphoNet: An interactive online morphological browser to explore complex multi-scale data. Nat Commun. 10(1):2812

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2-year post-doctoral funding: robustness of ascidian embryogenesis to environmental and experimental variation

Posted by , on 1 April 2022

Closing Date: 11 May 2022

The tunicate team at CRBM (Montpellier, France), headed by Patrick Lemaire, is offering a 2-year post-doctoral fellowship (or a 3-year PhD fellowship for an exceptional candidate) to study the robustness of animal embryonic development to genetic and environmental perturbations, using quantitative live imaging of ascidian embryos. A short video describes a recent piece of work of the team relevant to the project.

Why ascidians?

Ascidians are a group of marine invertebrates. Their embryonic cell lineages and early embryonic stage morphologies have remained essentially identical since the group’s emergence about 400 million years ago. This suggests that they are subject to very strong developmental or evolutionary constraints (Lemaire et al. 2011). Ascidian embryogenesis is also very robust to environmental perturbations of temperature and salinity. The extreme evolutionary and environmental robustness of embryonic geometries and cell lineages contrasts with a rapid genetic divergence between species and intra- and inter-specific variability in gene expression.

What is the project?

The proposed experimental project will provide a quantitative assessment of the developmental robustness of a critical morphogenetic process, ascidian gastrulation (1, 3, 5), to two key environmental parameters (water temperature and salinity) and to genetic perturbations of the morphogenetic driving force apparatus (myosin II, Rho kinase, …). The project will study the magnitude of environmental or genetic variations compatible with the production of a viable larva. It will seek to identify the least – and most – robust developmental processes and time points, i. e. those that collapse first, or resist best to the perturbations. Finally, it will characterize the structure of the natural and experimentally-induced variability in the geometry and mechanical properties of embryos. This may lead to the identification of developmental modules.

The project will involve advanced light-sheet imaging of live micro-injected embryos of the ascidian Phallusia mammillata, followed by the computational and statistical analysis of the acquired developmental movies (see 2, 4).

Who funds the project, and how to apply?

The project is funded by an ANR-NSF binational project grant and will be conducted in collaboration with 3 other teams: Prof. Atef Asnacios (MSC, Paris), Prof. Edwin Munro (U. Chicago, USA) and Prof. Madhav Mani (Northwestern University, Evanston, USA).

Expected candidates will have a PhD in cell and developmental biology, an excellent track record of publications and oral communications, strong skills in fluorescent live imaging and some experience in the computational analysis of large datasets. To apply, send Patrick Lemaire (patrick.lemaire[at]crbm.cnrs.fr) by May 11, 2022 at the latest a motivation letter, a CV and the names and contact details of 2 academic referees including the PhD supervisor. A working knowledge of English (B2) is needed, there is no prerequisite in French.

References
  1. Fiuza U.-M. and Lemaire, P. (2021) Mechanical and genetic control of ascidian endoderm invagination during gastrulation, Semin Cell Dev Biol 120:108-118
  2. Guignard L. *, Fiuza U.-M. *, Leggio B., Laussu J., Faure E., Michelin G., Biasuz K., Hufnagel L., Malandain G. #, Godin C. #, Lemaire P.# (2020) Contact-area dependent cell communications and the morphological invariance of ascidian embryogenesis. Science, 369 :6500 eaar5663
  3. Fiuza U-M, Negishi T., Rouan A., Yasuo H.#, Lemaire P. # (2020) Nodal and Eph signalling relay drives the transition between apical constriction and apico-basal shortening during ascidian endoderm invagination. Development 147: dev186965
  4. Leggio, B; Laussu J; Carlier, A; Godin, C; Lemaire, P and Faure, E (2019) MorphoNet: An interactive online morphological browser to explore complex multi-scale data. Nat Commun.10(1):2812
  5. Lemaire P. (2011) Evolutionary crossroads in developmental biology: the tunicates, Development, 138(11):2143-52
  6. Sherrard, K., Robin, FB, Lemaire, P., and Munro, E. (2010) Sequential activation of apical and basolateral myosin drives endoderm invagination during ascidian gastrulation, Current Biology, 20(17):1499-510.
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Developing news

Posted by , on 29 March 2022

Read on for our news roundup of the past month, with an emphasis on what has caught our eyes on twitter. This month, we also include a list of meetings with upcoming deadlines, as well as a selection of preLights.

#leavingacademia

At the beginning of the month, it seemed like everyone was #leavingacademia. Below are a few of our favourite threads that highlight some of the challenges that academics face, but also the upsides of academic research and working with industry.

Conference time

It has been great to see the return of so many in-person conference. With ‘conference fever’ in mind, we have put together a list of #devbio and #stemcell meeting with upcoming abstract and registration deadlines. You can find a list of upcoming conferences on our events page. If we are missing your event, then please feel free to add it to our planner.

MeetingAbstract deadlineRegistration deadlineMeeting start date
The ISRB Regeneration Around the World Meetingpassed17.04.2219.04.22
EMBO Workshop: Muscle formation, maintenance, regeneration and pathologypassed10/04/22 (virtual only)24.04.22
GRC: Fibroblast Growth Factors in Development and Disease03.04.2203.04.2201.05.22
GRC: Single-Cell Genomics03.04.2203.04.2201.05.22
EMBO | EMBL Symposium Cellular mechanisms driven by phase separation02.05.22 (virtual only)09.05.22
Weinstein Cardiovascular Development and Regeneration Conference30.03.22Open12.05.22
Fusion Conference – Probing Human Disease Using Single-Cell Technologies Conferencepassed15.04.2213.05.22
EMBO | EMBL Symposium Mechanobiology in development and diseasepassed08.05.2022 (virtual only)15.05.22
EMBO Workshop Awakening of the genome: The maternal-to-zygotic transition01.04.2201.04.2218.05.22
EMBO Workshop: Developmental circuits in aging05.04.2205.04.2227.05.22
Euro Evo Devo31.05.22
55th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society of Developmental Biologists04.04.2222.04.2231.05.22
Stem Cells for Disease Modeling and Regeneration29.04.2229.04.2227.06.22
EMBO Workshop: Timing Mechanisms in Linking Development and Evolution20.04.2209.05.2229.06.22
Joint SDB and PASEDB Meeting11.04.2209.05.22 (early deadline)17.07.22
European Worm Meeting 202201.05.22 (for talks)27.07.22
The Company of Biologists Workshop – From Physics to Function08.04.22 (ECRs only)09.10.22
The Company of Biologists Workshop – Developmental Metabolism and the Origins of Health and Disease22.04.22 (ECRs only)24.10.22
Please note that some meetings may be full before their application deadline.

The thread below from Katie Martin includes horror stories that you may (or may not) want to read before attending your next meeting!

https://twitter.com/katiedimartin/status/1502756916006723589

If you are interested in reducing the carbon footprint of your meeting, check out The Company of Biologists Sustainable Conferencing Initiative.

Just for fun!

preLights in #devbio

A study in the silkworm Bombyx mori reveals that the Hox gene Antennapedia has a function in wing development

Cha-cha-cha…Histones’ coordinated dance during development

Could the timing of trunk formation be a major driver in larval evolution?

Ever wondered how we can model the human brain in a dish? Organoids and assembloids mimic the structure and complexity of the human brain!

Preprints hitting the headlines! How do journalists report on preprinted research?

“Special Source”: How the donor animal origin defines applicability of cells for use in cultured meat

If you are interested in science communication, would like to improve your writing skills and become part of the preLights community, don’t miss the open call for new preLighters.

If you would like to write for the Node, check out our recent list of writing ideas. If you would like to contribute to our ‘Developing news’ blog, please get in touch at thenode@biologists.com

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A journey towards understanding the embryo – maternal vasculature interactions during implantation

Posted by , on 27 March 2022

My journey in the field of mammalian developmental biology began when I joined the lab of Dr Ivan Bedzhov at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine (MPI-MB) in 2016 to pursue my doctoral research. After Ivan and I discussed the many important processes that take place during the peri-implantation phase of embryonic development, it was the unaddressed mechanisms by which the embryo forms the first contacts with the mother during implantation that caught my interest the most.

The process of implantation mediates the first direct interactions between the embryo and the mother. Specialized cells of the mouse embryo, known as trophoblast giant cells (TGCs), invade deep into the uterine tissues, enabling nutrient uptake and gas exchange with the maternal environment. In turn, the uterine stroma rapidly proliferates and completely engulfs the implanting embryo. Thus, studying the process of implantation is fundamentally challenging, as the embryo is concealed by the uterine tissues and its development depends on the maternal support.

According to clinical reports, almost half of the human pregnancies fail at the time of implantation (Boomsma et al., 2009; Koot et al., 2012). However, the cellular mechanisms of implantation and the factors causing termination of pregnancy are very poorly understood. The significance of these open questions and the excitement to understand the first interactions between an embryo and the mother motivated me to work on this project.

A glimpse at the trophoblast – maternal vasculature interactions in utero

As an early miscarriage can happen because of poor trophoblast penetration and/or inadequate blood supply to the implantation site (Klauber et al., 1997; Reus et al., 2013; Torry et al., 2007), we were keen to understand whether an active crosstalk between the TGCs and the maternal blood vessels takes place during the implantation stages. We examined the spatial organization of the TGCs and determined that the invasive trophoblast is organised as strands of cells penetrating the uterine stroma. Moreover, we found that the TGCs of the implanting embryo intermingle with the surrounding blood vessels (Fig. 1). As static images were insufficient to study the dynamics of these interactions, we decided to establish a 3D biomimetic platform that resembles the biomechanical properties of the uterine stroma.

Figure 1: Whole mount image of uteri containing E4.75 LifeAct GFP Embryo stained for – LifeAct GFP Embryo (GFP) in green, blood vessels (PECAM1) in red and nuclei (DAPI) in blue. White arrow indicates invasive trophoblast intermingling with the surrounding blood vessel.

Establishment of the 3D biomimetic platform

First, we determined the stiffness of the maternal tissues using atomic force microscopy (AFM) and examined the cell adhesive properties of the endometrium. As we also had to take into account that the TGCs secrete matrix metalloproteinases (Zhu et al., 2012), we used biodegradable synthetic hydrogels as our artificial substrate. We tuned the stiffness and adhesive features of the hydrogels to mimic the biomechanical properties of the uterine stroma, (in collaboration with Dr Britta Trappmann’s and Dr Adrian Ranga’s labs).  Culturing embryos in this 3D environment enabled us to directly observe ex utero implantation of the embryos for the first time, which was very exciting!

As our main focus was to understand the crosstalk between the invading TGCs and the maternal vasculature, we teamed up with Hongyan Long from Dr Britta Trappmann’s lab to incorporate the implanting embryos into a microfluidic device (Trappmann et al., 2017) which allowed us to model the interactions with the blood vessels. After several months of tireless efforts and optimization, we managed to establish the right conditions for co-culturing embryos and endothelial cells in the microfluidic chip. Using this platform, we found that the invasive trophoblast migrates towards the blood vessels to form direct cell-cell contacts, similar to the static images in vivo (Movie 1). This was truly fascinating and a very rewarding moment for us.

Movie 1: Timelapse movie of LifeAct GFP embryo and tdTomato expressing endothelial cells co-cultured in microfluidic device

Uncovering the molecular basis of the trophoblast – vasculature interactions

Next, we wanted to examine the signalling crosstalk that mediates these interactions. We are grateful to Dr Hyun-Woo Jeong from Professor Dr Ralf Adams lab, who helped us with the bioinformatic analysis. We found that the TGCs gain expression of cell surface receptors, ligands and adhesion molecules, similar to the ones expressed in the nearby blood vessels. By functionally examining the main players in this process, we found that platelet-derived growth factor receptor (PDGFR) signalling promotes the establishment of direct cell-cell contacts between the TGCs and the vasculature. As PDGFR signalling has been previously shown to mediate the recruitment of pericytes to the endothelial cells (Lindahl et al., 1997), our findings suggested that the TGCs exploit this signalling pathway to locate the endothelial cells of the maternal blood vessels. Consequently, the expression of compatible cell adhesion molecules in the TGCs and the vasculature, such as VE-cadherin, enables the formation of heterologous cell-cell contacts. This discovery also has a potential clinical relevance, as it has been shown that the PDGFR inhibitor used for the treatment of chronic myeloid leukaemia increases the risk of miscarriage in experimental animals and pregnant patients (Salem et al., 2019; Ault et al., 2006; Pye et al., 2008) and the reason for this side effect was so far obscure.

Bumps along the way

Like most of the projects in academic research, the road of our journey to understand the embryo maternal interaction was not always smooth. We did face unfortunate situations, but at the same time we also got a lot of positive comments from colleagues around the world about the novelty of the project and this encouraged us that we were on the right path. Most of the methods used in this study required intense optimization. We did get stuck sometimes but we kept trying and found new ways to overcome technical limitations, which also helped me to expand my skills and critical thinking. I am really thankful to all our collaborators for their time to discuss and troubleshoot challenging experimental approaches. We learned a lot through failed experiments and eventually when we look at the new discoveries that we’ve made, I think it was all worth the effort!

When we submitted our work to two of the top journals, we experienced major delays as reviewers that accepted the invitation to review our manuscript did not respond and kept us waiting for several months. At this point we had no choice but to move to another journal, as we were running out of time and funding. This happened twice and we lost 9 months just waiting for the initial review, despite the best efforts of the editors of these journals. Having to wait so long was very stressful. Unfortunately, other colleagues have also had similar experiences, so it is up to us, the research community as well as the journals to prevent such toxic behaviour. We finally found a good home for our manuscript in Developmental Cell, where the editors are doing their best to ensure fair peer-review process and present exciting new research to the community.

In the End…

Looking back, this journey has taught me that passion, compassion, clear objectives, perseverance, and interdisciplinary collaborations are key for making new discoveries. Looking forward, I hope that one day, our findings will help scientists understand how the human embryo establishes its first direct contacts with the mother and will lead to therapeutic approaches that substantially decrease the risk of an early miscarriage.    

Access the articleNiraimathi Govindasamy, Hongyan Long, Hyun-Woo Jeong, Ratish Raman, Burak Özcifci, Simone Probst, Sebastian J Arnold, Kristina Riehemann, Adrian Ranga, Ralf H Adams, Britta Trappmann, Ivan Bedzhov.3D biomimetic platform reveals the first interactions of the embryo and the maternal blood vessels. Dev Cell. 2021 Dec 6;56(23):3276-3287.e8.

References:

Ault, P., Kantarjian, H., O’Brien, S., Faderl, S., Beran, M., Rios, M.B., Koller, C., Giles, F., Keating, M., Talpaz, M., et al. (2006). Pregnancy among patients with chronic myeloid leukemia treated with imatinib. J Clin Oncol 24, 1204-1208.

Boomsma, C.M., Kavelaars, A., Eijkemans, M.J., Lentjes, E.G., Fauser, B.C., Heijnen, C.J., and Macklon, N.S. (2009). Endometrial secretion analysis identifies a cytokine profile predictive of pregnancy in IVF. Hum Reprod 24, 1427-1435.

Klauber, N., Rohan, R.M., Flynn, E., and D’Amato, R.J. (1997). Critical components of the female reproductive pathway are suppressed by the angiogenesis inhibitor AGM-1470. Nat Med 3, 443-446.

Koot, Y.E., Teklenburg, G., Salker, M.S., Brosens, J.J., and Macklon, N.S. (2012). Molecular aspects of implantation failure. Biochim Biophys Acta 1822, 1943-1950.

Lindahl, P., Johansson, B.R., Leveen, P., and Betsholtz, C. (1997). Pericyte loss and microaneurysm formation in PDGF-B-deficient mice. Science 277, 242-245.

Pye, S.M., Cortes, J., Ault, P., Hatfield, A., Kantarjian, H., Pilot, R., Rosti, G., and Apperley, J.F. (2008). The effects of imatinib on pregnancy outcome. Blood 111, 5505-5508.

Reus, A.D., El-Harbachi, H., Rousian, M., Willemsen, S.P., Steegers-Theunissen, R.P.M., Steegers, E.A.P., and Exalto, N. (2013). Early first-trimester trophoblast volume in pregnancies that result in live birth or miscarriage. Ultrasound Obst Gyn 42, 577-584.

Salem, W., Li, K., Krapp, C., Ingles, S.A., Bartolomei, M.S., Chung, K., Paulson, R.J., Nowak, R.A., and McGinnis, L.K. (2019). Imatinib treatments have long-term impact on placentation and embryo survival. Sci Rep 9, 2535.

Torry, D.S., Leavenworth, J., Chang, M., Maheshwari, V., Groesch, K., Ball, E.R., and Torry, R.J. (2007). Angiogenesis in implantation. J Assist Reprod Genet 24, 303-315.

Trappmann B., Baker B.M., Polacheck W.J., Choi C.K., Burdick J.A., Chen C.S. Matrix degradability controls multicellularity of 3D cell migration. Nat. Commun. 2017; 8: 371

Zhu, J.Y., Pang, Z.J., and Yu, Y.H. (2012). Regulation of trophoblast invasion: the role of matrix metalloproteinases. Rev Obstet Gynecol 5, e137-143.

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FocalPlane launches the FocalPlane Network

Posted by , on 25 March 2022

Our sister site, FocalPlane, has recently launched the FocalPlane Network, a global directory for microscopists. Like the Node Network, the FocalPlane Network was created with diversity in mind, and is entirely inclusive. Anyone with expertise in microscopy, including developers, imaging scientists, biologists and bioimage analysts, at any career stage, can enter themselves into the database. Members are also invited to provide diversity information such as gender, race/ethnicity, LGBTQ+ identity and disability status, although there is no requirement to do so. Users can access the network to search for potential collaborators, speakers, committee members and reviewers, using filters based on scientific expertise, geographic location, and aspects of diversity. 

We would encourage anyone using microscopy in their research to add themselves to the database, and invite early-career researchers in particular who may be less visible to the microscopy community. Visit the FocalPlane site for more information about the network and FAQs.

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ABC-RI International Forum – Spring 2022

Posted by , on 24 March 2022

“GENE AND CELL THERAPIES FOR HEALTHY AGEING” (virtual event)

April 12th 2022 (1-4 pm GMT, Lisbon Time),

PROGRAM:
13:00 Welcome
– 13:05 Keynote: Bruno Silva-Santos, Instituto de Medicina Molecular João Lobo Antunes, Portugal.
“Delta One T cells: development of a novel adoptive cell therapy for cancer”
– 14:05 Clévio Nóbrega, Algarve Biomedical Research Institute, Faro, Portugal.
“Towards modifying gene therapies for spinocerebellar ataxias”
– 14:55 Break
– 15:00 Miguel Sena-Esteves, UMass Chan Medical School, USA.
“AAV gene therapy for neurological diseases”
– 15:50 Closing Remarks

FREE REGISTRATION: bit.ly/ABCRI-SIF2022.

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