Issues

Summary: A novel insight into the molecular mechanisms of determinate growth in cucumber and a strategy for fine-tuning plant architecture using CsTFL1 to adapt to different cucumber production systems.

Summary: This Meeting Review reports on the main results presented at the EMBO-EMBL Symposium ‘Synthetic Morphogenesis: From Gene Circuits to Tissue Architecture’ held in Germany in March 2019.

Summary: This Primer provides an overview of salamanders as a model system for studying regeneration, outlining the mechanisms deployed during salamander regeneration and highlighting how the study of salamanders has increased our understanding of regeneration more broadly.

Summary: This Primer gives an overview of the molecular and structural characteristics of telocytes, a cell type with a wide distribution and diverse range of proposed functions.

Highlighted Article: During primitive endoderm differentiation in mouse, ERK activation is regulated by NANOG, which induces the expression of both Fgf4 and Etv5, providing intrinsic and extrinsic signals at the same time.

Highlighted Article: BMP4 generates the patterning of dorsal spinal cell types in mouse and human pluripotent stem cell-derived organoids.

Summary: Live imaging and single cell clonal analysis reveal dynamic behaviors of zebrafish embryonic muscle progenitor cells in quiescence and activation.

Summary: Mouse lines in which two distinct pacemaker cell populations can be distinguished reveal a novel role for Nkx2-5 in pacemaking function in the sinoatrial node.

Summary: A novel genetic strategy allowing the tracing of axonal projections in mouse brain identifies Rorβ as a key factor regulating axonal targeting to distinct subcortical areas.

Summary: Collectively migrating cells not only respond to extrinsic molecular cues and surrounding topology, but can also physically modify the morphogenesis of their tissue substrate.

Highlighted Article: Monitor lizards, which have the most-pronounced ventricular septation of lizards, express evolutionarily conserved transcription factors and exhibit a specialized manner of electrical activation.

Summary: Dchs1-Fat4 signalling plays a crucial role in osteogenesis by regulating Runx2 activity via Yap and Taz, providing insight into how craniofacial development may be altered in Van Maldegem syndrome.

Highlighted Article: The development of protrusions, such as eminences and condyles, along long bones in mice is coordinated by a patterning mechanism involving global and regional genetic regulation.

Summary: The expression of doublesex in sexually dimorphic structures in Drosophila legs and genitalia is regulated by tissue-specific cis-regulatory elements, providing insight into how cells obtain their sex-specific identity.

Summary: MOZ (KAT6A, MYST3), a histone acetyltransferase and chromatin writer, is essential for normal craniofacial development, where it regulates gene expression, including the distal-less homeobox 5 transcription factor gene.

Summary: The microRNA mir167 limits Arabidopsis anther expansion growth shortly before flowers open. Without this regulation, enlarged anthers do not desiccate enough to dehisce and release pollen.

Summary: New pdx1 expression modulators are identified in zebrafish, and their ability to induce pancreatic endoderm formation, transdifferentiation of α-cells to β-cells and β-cell maturation is assessed at different stages of pancreas development.

Summary: Hat-trick, a novel interactor of Notch that genetically interacts with Notch pathway components, is a component of the Notch-Su(H) activation complex and positively regulates Notch signaling.

Summary: The wheat MADS-box proteins VRN1, FUL2 and FUL3 are essential for the initial development of the lateral and terminal spikelets, and control the number of spikelets per spike.

Highlighted Article: Using several different methods of perturbation, we identify molecular and tissue-level factors involved in the adaptive self-correction of malformed craniofacial tissue in the vertebrate Xenopus laevis.

Highlighted Article: A mouse Il7r-Cre lineage-tracing model, together with blockade of IL7R function and germline deletion of IL7R, provide evidence for the interleukin 7 receptor as a regulator of fetal macrophage development during late gestation.

Highlighted Article: Rhombomeric boundary cells act as mechanosensors through Yap/Taz-TEAD activity, affecting progenitor maintenance and therefore balancing proliferation and differentiation.

Summary: Two duplicated maize SCARECROW genes control the development of the endodermis in roots and the mesophyll in leaves.

Summary: Physiological and molecular defects in the lacrimal glands of Eda^−/− mice reveal that Eda signaling contributes to the cornea/lacrimal gland feedback loop in both basal and reflex tear production.

Summary: Conditional knockout of Sall4, a stem cell gene, reveals roles in neuromesodermal progenitors and their descendants in post-gastrulation mouse embryos.

Summary: We optimize a procedure for enzyme-catalyzed proximity labeling in live Drosophila ovary tissue to interrogate the Drosophila ring canal protein interactome.