The first Danionella paper from the lab. Danionella cerebrum is transparent, so you can see all of the internal organs. But what sensory information are the organs sending to the brain? In our new preprint, Emily Bayer wanted to find out. 1/4 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

Congratulations to Yuping Li on being awarded a prestigious ERC Starting Grant. In her project, she will investigate how bacteria detect and defend themselves against giant viruses known as jumbophages.🧪 @yuping-li.bsky.social @unibas.ch @erc.europa.eu #ERCStartingGrant #research #lifesciences

ERC Starting Grant for Yuping Li

Giant viruses are masters in evading bacterial defense systems. With a Starting Grant from the European Research Council (ERC), Prof. Yuping Li will investigate how bacteria detect and fight these gia...

biozentrum.unibas.ch

What regulates the urge to sleep? William Joo and colleagues identified brain regions that reflect how long mice have been awake. Strikingly, inhibiting one of these regions reduces sleep by 70%, without the major behavioral deficits associated with sleep deprivation. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Wake-activated neuronal populations that regulate sleep drive - Nature

Whole-brain activity mapping, targeted cell manipulations and electrophysiology in mice identify wake-activated neuronal populations that are crucial for sleep drive and can persistently red...

nature.com

"We have no business applying to this," #GilliamFellow Sara Makanani told her PI. Her mentor’s reply? "We are worthy of this." // 2nd- or 3rd-year PhD student? Talk to your faculty advisor — apps open 9/1 for our BIGGEST cohort of mentee-mentor pairs yet! bit.ly/gilliam26

Come join us at the @biozentrum.unibas.ch as Professor in Climate Biophysics. Blue-sky research, inspiring colleagues, and generous support.

Ben Engel@cellarchlab.com · 2mo ago

Super excited to launch this search for a new endowed professor at the @biozentrum.unibas.ch! Join us to build a research cluster in Climate Biophysics! 🌍🌊🌾🔬🧪 This is a unique opportunity to create a community in Basel🇨🇭working together on this timely topic! ⏳🌡️ Questions? Please reach out! 👩‍🔬👨‍🔬

Might cerebellar disinhibition underlie Restless Legs Syndrome symptoms? Will Joo found that loss of the RLS-associated gene meis1b perturbs locomotion in zebrafish by disinhibiting cerebellar output. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

11/11 Big picture: the larval zebrafish olfactory bulb is organized spatially, transcriptionally, and functionally in ways that reflect behavioral preference. Paper: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

7/11 Luckily, @yinanwan.bsky.social and Jakob developed a powerful approach for multiplexed whole-mount gene-expression mapping. Sequentially imaging 68 genes in intact larval brains, defined anatomical and transcriptional boundaries of the olfactory bulb at cellular resolution.

1/11 Excited to share my postdoc work from @schierlab.bsky.social and Rainer Friedrich! 🐟👃 How does the brain decide whether an odor is good or bad? In larval zebrafish, we find that odor preference is reflected in spatially cohesive neuronal domains of the olfactory bulb. 🧵

Interpretable decoding of cell fate from a snapshot of combinatorial signaling https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.05.17.725652v1

🧪 A new study led by Dr. Janani Durairaj and Prof. Torsten Schwede shows that current AI models in drug discovery still face limitations. Learn more👇 @ninjani.bsky.social @torstenschwede.bsky.social @unibas.ch @snsf.ch @natureportfolio.nature.com www.biozentrum.unibas.ch/news/detail/...

AI models still reach limits in drug discovery

Developing new medicines is a slow and costly process. For some years now, artificial intelligence (AI) has been considered a promising tool to accelerate drug discovery by identifying drug candidates...

biozentrum.unibas.ch

Jack Szostak "All of these things frighten me, and they should frighten you as well. I made the decision to create a life for myself here, because I viewed this as a place that rewarded determination, hard work, and integrity. It still has a chance to be that place again."

I’m a Nobel Prize-winning immigrant. I can no longer recognize this country.

Attacks on science and immigrants are destroying America.

open.substack.com

With this “Behind the paper” story, I’d like to give special thanks to two remarkable contributors whose generosity made a big difference: @jialinliu.bsky.social for the scMultiomics data behind the multiomic atlas, and Guoqiang Yu’s group for sharing ITEC cell tracking, which enabled MERFISH-FATE.

the Node@the-node.bsky.social · 5mo ago

From fate to form: the journey to whole-embryo spatial transcriptomics In this 'Behind the paper' feature, @yinanwan.bsky.social shares the inside story of an ambitious journey with @schierlab.bsky.social & co. thenode.biologists.com/from-fate-to...

From fate to form: the journey to whole-embryo spatial transcriptomics In this 'Behind the paper' feature, @yinanwan.bsky.social shares the inside story of an ambitious journey with @schierlab.bsky.social & co. thenode.biologists.com/from-fate-to...

From fate to form: the journey to whole-embryo spatial transcriptomics - the Node

Where molecules meet form I have long been interested in understanding how development emerges at the intersection of molecular and spatial organization.

thenode.biologists.com

"We want to see the academic publishing industry change in a way that benefits science, not just profits"

Theo@earthowned.bsky.social · 5mo ago

Cancer Research UK is fed up of paying too much for open access publishing so they are completely stopping funding this activity: news.cancerresearchuk.org/2026/04/01/w...

A question I get asked all the time by @dev-journal.bsky.social authors "Why does it cost so much to publish a paper?" We break down the finances and explain where the money goes Spoiler: quality publishing takes a village (people + infrastructure) journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...

‘Why is publishing so expensive?’

For many of us who work in scientific publishing, the title of this Editorial is a question we hear all the time when we're out talking to academics. And it's a perfectly reasonable one. After all, re...

journals.biologists.com

Prof. Markus Rüegg and Dr. Judith Reinhard joined the Telebasel studio to talk about progress and the ongoing challenges of the gene therapy they’ve developed to treat LAMA2-related muscular dystrophy, a currently incurable and fatal muscle disease affecting children. telebasel.ch/sendungen/pu...

Basler Forschende entwickeln Gentherapie gegen… | Telebasel

Ungefähr jedes Jahr wird in der Schweiz ein Kind mit einer schweren Muskelschwäche geboren. LAMA2-Muskeldystrophie ist unheilbar. Nun haben Forschende am…

telebasel.ch

It's out! Happy to present ITEC, a semi supervised algorithm with an extremely low error rate that can track cells in files of any size (think Terabytes!). We used it in many organisms, including zebrafish, to study how organs form and linked it to gene expression www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... +🧪

Embryogenesis in 4D: a developmental atlas for genes and cells 🧪 @schierlab.bsky.social developed a new method (#weMERFISH) that visualizes the activity of hundreds of genes across the entire zebrafish embryo with subcellular resolution. lnkd.in/eHY5gXDx @erc.europa.eu @snsf.ch @unibas.ch

How does a tiny cluster of cells become an embryo? Researchers @biozentrum.unibas.ch mapped gene activity across the entire zebrafish embryo, creating a 4D atlas that links gene expression to cell movement & development. www.unibas.ch/en/News-Even...

Embryogenesis in 4D: a developmental atlas for genes and cells

Researchers at the University of Basel create a 4D atlas revealing how thousands of genes shape embryonic development in the zebrafish embryo.

unibas.ch

Very grateful to everyone who made this work possible. I feel incredibly lucky to have worked with such an amazing team. Special thanks to: Jakob El Kholtei, KJ Jenie, @mcolomerr.bsky.social, and of course our wonderful collaborator Bogdan Bintu and my mentor @schierlab.bsky.social

Alex Schier@schierlab.bsky.social · 6mo ago

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...

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

TODAY IS THE DAY. NATIONWIDE rallies in your local city are kicking off today to SAVE SCIENCE, PROTECT HEALTH, and DEFEND DEMOCRACY. Visit standupforscience.net/march7 to find your local rally! GET OUT THERE SCIENCE ACTIVISTS!!! #March7 #standupforscience #science #rally #savescience

The Summer Call for our prestigious, fully funded #PhDFellowships is now open to talented early-career scientists worldwide. 🔬 Rotation-based program 🌍 International community 🗓 Apply by May 8, 2026 Apply now and join a leading life sciences institute! www.biozentrum.unibas.ch/phd/internat...

Biozentrum PhD Fellowships

Share your passion for life sciences. If you are talented and highly motivated, want to broaden your horizons and are interested in a wide range of research topics, apply for one of the sought after B...

biozentrum.unibas.ch

One more week to finalize your applications for the 2026 MBL zebrafish course at Woods Hole! Application deadline extended to March 9. Please repost and forward to anyone interested in learning 'everything zebrafish'! www.mbl.edu/education/ad...

Zebrafish Development and Genetics | Marine Biological Laboratory

Over the past 30 years, the zebrafish has emerged as a powerful model system for the study of vertebrate development and disease. This course will focus on the development and genetics of zebrafish an...

mbl.edu

Pauli Group (posts by Andi Pauli)@pauligroup.bsky.social · 7mo ago

Interested in expanding your zebrafish skills or completely new to zebrafish as model system for your research question? Then this course is for YOU! Deadline for applying is on March 2nd, so get your applications in. PS: It's a fantastic course - changed my own career! www.mbl.edu/education/ad...

Deadline March 1. Join the new Dietschy Facility for Tissue Science. www.biozentrum.unibas.ch/open-positio...

Deadline March 1. Join the new Dietschy Facility for Tissue Science. www.biozentrum.unibas.ch/open-positio...

Deadline March 1. Join the new Dietschy Facility for Tissue Science. www.biozentrum.unibas.ch/open-positio...

Switching fields or wanting to become an expert in #zebrafish research? The @mblscience.bsky.social 2026 Zebrafish Development & Genetics course offers a fantastic opportunity to learn from leaders in the field! Application deadline: March 2 Please spread the word! www.mbl.edu/education/ad...

Thinking about EZM2026 in Vienna? 🐟 Travel grants are now open for students & ECRs. 7–11 July 2026 | Deadline: March 15 Hope to see many of you there! @ezsociety.bsky.social #zebrafish