Years of tracking T+ cells now a preprint! We show APLNR directs mesoderm migration in gastruloids and plays a role in spatial fate patterning. 🙏 @sseethar.bsky.social @alex-plum.bsky.social @heemskerklab.bsky.social @mattiaserra.bsky.social @squishycell.bsky.social 🔗 tinyurl.com/aplnrmeso
Susie Wopat
@suewop.bsky.social
👩💻NICHD K99/R00 fellow 🔬Postdoc researcher in the Streichan Lab at UCSB, PhD with the Bagnat Lab at Duke 🧬 Cell and developmental biologist endeavoring to integrate quantitative approaches from Physics 🐟Zebrafish enthusiast
When cells in different phases fuse, nuclei play a mitotic tug-of-war @olgaafonso.bsky.social, Daniel Feliciano & Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz investigate the fate of syncytia containing nuclei at different cell cycle stages. Highlight: journals.biologists.com/jcs/article/...
What’s inside the black box of cis-regulatory control? Our new review proposes a conceptual framework for understanding how regulatory inputs are integrated, linking molecular mechanisms to sequence constraints and quantitative rules, across scales.
New commentary from the lab - can we identify principles of transcriptional regulation & cis-regulatory element (CRE) control of gene expression? With @jcornwallscoones.bsky.social & @joadelas.bsky.social in @cp-molcell.bsky.social A thread 🧵 doi.org/10.1016/j.mo...
Our work is finally out! How do organs get the right shape and size on time? Using the zebrafish inner ear canal, we show that a mechanical feedback loop between the ECM and Yap1 drives timely tissue growth, and a built-in termination system shuts it down once morphogenesis is done.
A self-limiting mechanotransduction feedback loop ensures robust organ formation - Nature Communications
Developing tissues must acquire the correct shape. This study shows that mechanical feedback between the extracellular matrix and Yap sustains timely tissue growth, while Adgrg6 terminates the feedbac...
nature.com
It was fun to write this commentary with @priyomadhyapok.bsky.social on a beautiful new paper from @pfrancois.bsky.social and Aulehla's groups. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Invariances in an ever-variant environment | PNAS
Invariances in an ever-variant environment
pnas.org
In the mid 1900s, not everyone even believed that genes played a significant role in development. C.H. Waddington’s iconic epigenetic landscapes helped to change that. New data both confirms and complicates his ideas. www.quantamagazine.org/how-does-lif...
How Does Life Unfold? A Landscape Metaphor Comes Into Its Own. | Quanta Magazine
C.H. Waddington’s powerful image of embryonic stem cells specializing on a rolling landscape has captivated biologists since the 1950s. Experimental data is finally confirming, and complicating, his v...
quantamagazine.org
DNA → RNA → protein. From single mRNAs to an entire developing vertebrate embryo, we can now watch this last step unfold in real time. Our paper is out today! 🐟🔬 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
Real-time single-molecule imaging in zebrafish embryos uncovers noncanonical translation
Precise spatiotemporal control of protein synthesis is essential during embryogenesis, yet directly measuring translation kinetics in vivo remains challenging in vertebrates. In particular, it remains...
science.org
Prescient reporting on Zhuo-Hua Pan being overlooked for his pioneering work in optogenetics, by @annaintegrated.bsky.social
Related to the #NobelPrize in #Optogenetics: I'm reflecting on the question "who invented X?" in science. 10 years ago I wrote about the people who were working on optogenetics, the patent debates and the role of race and prestige. I don't know the answer, but... www.statnews.com/2016/09/01/o...
BREAKING NEWS The 2026 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been awarded to Karl Deisseroth, Peter Hegemann and Georg Nagel “for their discoveries concerning light-gated ion channels and optogenetics.”
We built a fully functional LegoAFM for imaging! 🤩... Today presented at #TürenAuf Tag der #SendungMitDerMaus! ... Remember: Always be curious! ⁉️
🧬 Preprint! 🧵 Our goal is to genetically manipulate every embryonic germ layer to enable high throughput in vivo studies. We previously showed mouse ectoderm can be targeted by amniotic injection, enabling cell-specific manipulation, lineage tracing, and knockouts. But how to reach mesoderm?
How does a growing leaf stay flat? 🍃 Our new paper in @plosbiology.org shows that maintaining leaf flatness requires growth-rate coordination across the width of the leaf blade—not just between the top and bottom surfaces. journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...
The Brantley Lab is hiring a Research Technician/Lab Manager! Looking for someone with a strong foundation in molecular biology, a team player, and excited about basic science. If you know someone who would be a great fit, please share! spartantalent.uncg.edu/postings/35995
Research Lab Technician
The Brantley Lab is seeking a Research Technician who is passionate about basic science and being a reliable, collaborative member of an academic research team. Research in the Brantley Lab uses quant...
spartantalent.uncg.edu
The growth of #plant leaves is highly dynamic and should be coordinated, but how is #leaf flatness preserved? @roederlab.bsky.social &co show that global coordination of growth across the leaf blade is required to maintain flatness in #Arabidopsis @plosbiology.org 🧪 buff.ly/QUMxOcF
Since we had to contend with the heat dome temps, we sadly didn’t make our usual trip to the St. Louis Zoo, and checked out the (somewhat newer) aquarium instead! Now that know I what’s lurking beneath the surface of the Mississippi River… I don’t think I’ll be swimming in it anytime soon 🫣
This was a particularly special #morpho26 course with this amazing group of scientists (aka team M&Ms)! Thanks to course organizers @roederlab.bsky.social + @streichan.bsky.social, as well as @kitp-ucsb.bsky.social for providing a fun + creative environment to tackle quantitative bio questions 💭
Vought doesn’t want control over science. Vought wants to kill these agencies. He doesn't believe tax dollars should be spent on science or social programs. It's not about control; it's destruction. He intends to cancel grants and impound the money. It’s about corruption.
What a fun couple of days talking optogenetics, zebrafish embryogenesis, quantitative imaging, and more! Thanks @katwrog.bsky.social for visiting and sharing your awesome science with all of us at UCSB! @streichan.bsky.social
And now it is out officially! Thanks to our reviewers whose comments helped strengthen the work. I hope you read the revised version in @currentbiology.bsky.social www.cell.com/current-biol...
Rapid transcriptional response to a dynamic morphogen by time integration
Using quantitative live imaging, Brantley et al. reveal that cells decode dynamic BMP signaling during dorsal patterning of the Drosophila embryo by integrating activity over time. These results advan...
cell.com
🐟!JOB ALERT!Duke, Durham, NC!🐟 We are looking for a research tech (our current tech is starting grad school this Fall (Yay!)). The candidate will contribute to our ongoing research projects on tissue morphogenesis using zebrafish. Please RT🙏 www.munjallab.com/join-us
Opportunities — Principles of Tissue Morphogenesis (Munjal Lab)
munjallab.com
Very happy to see this out. 👏 @yinanwan.bsky.social Bogdan Bintu and team. Whole-embryo spatial transcriptomics at subcellular resolution from gastrulation to organogenesis | free link Science www.science.org/eprint/5MHTM...
Whole-embryo spatial transcriptomics at subcellular resolution from gastrulation to organogenesis
Gene expression patterns underlie development, but their systematic detection in whole embryos has remained elusive. We introduce a whole-embryo imaging platform using multiplexed error-robust fluores...
science.org
Previously we had shown that axolotl tail regeneration occurs in the absence of somitogenesis. In the updated manuscript we propose that vertebral segmentation during tail regeneration occurs through a process of buckling instability. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
biorxiv.org
Checkout this updated preprint-a tour de force and truly globe-spanning collaboration with an exceptional group of scientists.
Looking forward to sharing my postdoctoral work in just a little over a week at the UCAM Morphogenesis Series! 🐟🔬🔦
The Cambridge Morphogenesis Seminar Series is back! 🎉 Check out the flyer for a great lineup of speakers for Lent Term 2026! Don't forget to subscribe to our mailing list to get all the information, including the Zoom link. We are excited to see you again soon 👋
Elasticity without a reference state: continuum mechanics of active tension nets https://arxiv.org/pdf/2601.08968 Nikolas H. Claussen, Fridtjof Brauns, Boris I. Shraiman.
https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.08968
arXiv abstract link
arxiv.org
The next the Ethel Browne Harvey Postdoc Seminar will be this Friday, January 9 at 3 pm Eastern Time with Priyom Adhyapok @priyomadhyapok.bsky.social @duke-university.bsky.social and Zong-Yuan Liu @UMich. Register today and join us. bit.ly/4ncxr0M #SDBPostdocSeminar
Using fluorescence live imaging and an in vitro implantation model, we show that human embryo attachment begins with direct cell fusion via syncytin-2–MFSD2A interaction. With @hansclevers.bsky.social. Great work by @tnoordzij.bsky.social & @martinacelotti.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
📣 New preprint: Mechanochemical feedback, tissue geometry & rigid-body dynamics initiate rotational migration in Drosophila via spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking. A mechanism generalizable to closed epithelia. @sreejithsanthosh.bsky.social biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Happy to share our new work from my graduate lab: DynamicAtlas, a morphodynamic atlas of Drosophila development! We develop methods for morphological time alignment of live data. Surprisingly, we find that the kinematics of fly morphogenesis are *very* simple. Enjoy! www.nature.com/articles/s41...
DynamicAtlas: a morphodynamic atlas for Drosophila development - Nature Methods
DynamicAtlas integrates fixed and live imaging data to generate a morphodynamic atlas of Drosophila development.
nature.com