Advocacy
We are pleased to announce a series of review articles aiming to advocate for the wider importance of developmental biology.
The first set of articles sets out to answer the question “What has developmental biology ever done for us?” with a series of case studies linking particular discoveries in developmental biology to their wider scientific and societal impact. To complement this historical angle, the second set of articles looks forward and explore “What are the big open questions in the field?” We want to explore the fundamental unanswered questions in developmental biology and propose how we might start addressing them.
By providing a rationale for why we do developmental biology and where it is taking us, we hope that these articles will help to advocate for our discipline, providing a useful resource for developmental biology educators and advocates, and also help current researchers to develop their elevator pitches. Read our editorial for more information about the project.
The articles will be free to read and we welcome suggestions for topics readers find particularly compelling - send any inquiries to [email protected]. As the articles get published they will be added to this page.
History of our journals

As our publisher, The Company of Biologists, turns 100 years old, read about Development’s journey and highlights from some its first issues, and explore the history of each of our sister journals: Journal of Cell Science, Journal of Experimental Biology, Disease Models & Mechanisms and Biology Open.
Call for papers – Lifelong Development: the Maintenance, Regeneration and Plasticity of Tissues

Development invites you to submit your latest research to our upcoming special issue – Lifelong Development: the Maintenance, Regeneration and Plasticity of Tissues. This issue will be coordinated by Guest Editors Meritxell Huch (Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics, Germany) and Mansi Srivastava (Harvard University and Museum of Comparative Zoology, USA), working alongside our team of academic Editors. Submit your articles by 15 May 2025.
A case for broadening our view of mechanism in developmental biology

In this Perspective, B. Duygu Özpolat and colleagues survey researchers on their views on what it takes to infer mechanism in developmental biology. They examine what factors shape our idea of what we mean by ‘mechanism’ and suggest a path forward that embraces a broad outlook on the diversity of studies that advance knowledge in our field.
In preprints
Did you know that Development publishes perspectives on recent preprints? These articles help our readers navigate the ever-growing preprint literature. We welcome proposals for ‘In preprints’ articles, so please do get in touch if you’d like to contribute.