The 2nd part of my postdoc is now out as a preprint! A challenging but fulfilling team effort to perform genome editing in opossums. We found that the lncRNA RSX is essential to initiate X-inactivation in marsupials 🦘 A long-standing question since the discovery that Xist is absent in marsupials 👇

Turner Lab@lab-turner.bsky.social · 4w ago

New preprint 📢 Thrilled to share our long-awaited work on the role of RSX in marsupial X-inactivation. This was a huge team effort over the years, led by @aureliencourtois.bsky.social @sermenchero.bsky.social Sugako Ogushi and Waz Varsally, that allowed us to set up genome editing in opossum embryos

New preprint 📢 Thrilled to share our long-awaited work on the role of RSX in marsupial X-inactivation. This was a huge team effort over the years, led by @aureliencourtois.bsky.social @sermenchero.bsky.social Sugako Ogushi and Waz Varsally, that allowed us to set up genome editing in opossum embryos

Genome editing of marsupial RSX reveals conserved and divergent principles in mammalian X-inactivation

X-chromosome inactivation balances X-gene dosage between the sexes in eutherians and marsupials. The lncRNA Xist mediates X-inactivation in eutherians but is absent from marsupials. An evolutionarily ...

biorxiv.org

2026 Mammalian Reproduction GRC reminder: Deadline for abstract submission for oral presentation is June 1st, don't miss it!

Turner Lab@lab-turner.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Join us at the Mammalian Reproduction GRC conference next August in Maine! We have a fantastic line of speakers and free slots for talks selected from abstracts. Don't miss it! www.grc.org/mammalian-re...

Join us at the Mammalian Reproduction GRC conference next August in Maine! We have a fantastic line of speakers and free slots for talks selected from abstracts. Don't miss it! www.grc.org/mammalian-re...

More marsupial fun from @lab-turner.bsky.social. Congrats @sermenchero.bsky.social

Marsupial single-cell transcriptomics identifies temporal diversity in mammalian developmental programs - PubMed

Single-cell transcriptomics has demonstrated conserved and divergent programs of organogenesis in mammals, but existing studies have focused on eutherians. Marsupials exhibit short gestation and complete development externally, necessitating accelerated differentiation of anterior features required …

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Our latest 📢 We generated isogenic iPSCs with XX, XY, XO and XXY karyotypes to study sex chromosome effects 🧫 While XX and XY transcriptomes are similar, XO cells showed an important effect of the Y and inactive X @crick.ac.uk @stemcellreports.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

A human induced pluripotent stem cell toolbox for studying sex chromosome effects

Sex chromosomes shape male (XY)-female (XX) differences in development and disease. These differences can be modeled in vitro by comparing XY and XX h…

sciencedirect.com

@pnas.org Front Matter posted a nice summary of our recent work on opossum development @crick.ac.uk Thanks Amy McDermott for the highlight, and @amartinezarias.bsky.social for the comments. It says '6 min read', so now might be a good time www.pnas.org/post/journal...

In opossums, gene expression follows familiar rules but at a strange pace

The arms and heads of opossums (pictured here one day before birth) and other marsupials develop faster than their legs and back bodies. Image credit: Sergio Menchero Fernandez/ Francis Crick Institut...

pnas.org

Paper alert! 🚨 Something new from us, and this time it's not sex chromosome related 😱 All led by @sermenchero.bsky.social who used the opossum as a model to understand developmental heterochrony. Transcriptional and morphological progression of dev programs are decoupled www.cell.com/developmenta...

Sergio Menchero@sermenchero.bsky.social · last yr.

Thrilled to share that our latest work on marsupial heterochrony is now online at @cp-devcell.bsky.social @cellpress.bsky.social @lab-turner.bsky.social @crick.ac.uk We used scRNAseq to understand the asynchronous progression of developmental programmes in marsupials www.cell.com/developmenta...

You can also read a research briefing about the paper here: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Marsupial embryos lack the epigenetic reset seen in placental mammals

DNA-methylation marks remain stable in early-stage opossum embryos.

nature.com

We are looking to take on an intern at EMBL Rome, for anyone interested in CRISPR and Epigenetics training. The traineeship is 3-12-months, in Rome (Italy), should start by July, and is supervised by the outstanding @steliostsagkris.bsky.social. #job #internship; see info below...

We're excited to publish our latest study led by Bryony Leeke @bryonyleeke.bsky.social and Wazeer Varsally, now out in @nature.com 🍾This study focusses on the epigenome of marsupial embryos 🦘 mapping DNA methylation in embryo development to specific embryo events www.nature.com/articles/s41... 🧵

Divergent DNA methylation dynamics in marsupial and eutherian embryos - Nature

A study reports on the DNA methylation dynamics during embryogenesis in marsupials, showing that these differ from those occurring during embryogenesis in eutherian mammals.

nature.com

We are excited to share our latest preprint led by Ruta Meleckyte and Waz Varsally! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... We generated a set of human isogenic induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) that are autosomally identical but differ in sex chromosome composition: XX, XY or monosomic X

A human induced pluripotent stem cell toolbox for studying sex chromosome effects

Sex chromosomes shape male (XY) - female (XX) differences in development and disease. These differences can be modelled in vitro by comparing XY and XX human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs). H...

biorxiv.org

Registration and abstract submission for YEN 2025 is officially open! We are looking forward to seeing you at the 17th Young Embryologist Network Conference on the 19th May 2025. Attendence is FREE thanks to our amazing sponsors: @biologists.bsky.social @10xgenomics.bsky.social and Azenta.

Great summary of our latest paper studying the role of Y genes in spermatogenesis. ⬇️

The Francis Crick Institute@crick.ac.uk · 2y ago

Researchers at the Crick have uncovered which genes on the Y chromosome regulate the development of sperm and affect fertility in male mice. This could eventually help us to understand male infertility. www.crick.ac.uk/news-and-rep...

We thrilled to see our latest study led by @jeremie-subrini.bsky.social now out in @science.org 🔬 What are the specific functions of each Y-chromosome gene in fertility ? We generated and studied 13 Y-gene KO mouse models to find out! 🧬 www.science.org/doi/full/10....

I am thrilled to share our latest work, released today 🤩 www-nature-com.insb.bib.cnrs.fr/articles/s41... It results from years of hard work by the team and long-time collaborators, with special thanks to PhD student Clara Roidor and collaborator Laurène Syx.