Issues
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Cover image
Cover Image
Cover: Confocal images of Drosophila melanogaster embryos containing a 7 bp substitution of the downstream core promoter element (DPE) of the tinman gene, which orchestrates heart development. Staining of Mef2 (green), β-Galactosidase (red) and Hoechst (blue) reveals a critical impact of the DPE on embryogenesis and functional heart formation. See Research article by Sloutskin et al. (dev202355).
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PERSPECTIVES
INTERVIEW
REVIEWS
Mechanisms of regeneration: to what extent do they recapitulate development?
Summary: By comparing regeneration and development, this Review highlights new insights into morphogenesis, revealing potential non-developmental strategies for tissue regrowth.
Development of functional spermatozoa in mammalian spermiogenesis
Summary: This Review provides a comprehensive description of sperm morphogenesis in mammals by focusing on the molecules involved in the formation of acrosomes and tails.
STEM CELLS AND REGENERATION
Mycb and Mych stimulate Müller glial cell reprogramming and proliferation in the uninjured and injured zebrafish retina
Summary: Analysis of the effects of retinal injury in wild-type, mutant and transgenic zebrafish reveal that Mycb and Mych are potent reprogramming factors in Müller glia.
ERK signalling eliminates Nanog and maintains Oct4 to drive the formative pluripotency transition
Summary: ERK signalling has separable roles in exit from naïve pluripotency and establishment of formative pluripotency.
RESEARCH ARTICLES
Engrailed transcription factors direct excitatory cerebellar neuron diversity and survival
Summary: scRNA-seq and spatial expression analysis defines molecular subdomains of the mouse excitatory cerebellar nuclei neurons and demonstrates that Engrailed homeobox transcription factors promote excitatory neuron diversity, viability and differentiation.
From promoter motif to cardiac function: a single DPE motif affects transcription regulation and organ function in vivo
Summary: A single DPE core promoter motif in tinman is crucial for developmental gene regulatory networks in vivo, and for adult heart function and viability.
Hippo pathway inactivation through subcellular localization of NF2/merlin in outer cells of mouse embryos
Summary: The embryos expressing Nf2 mutant genes reveal how the orchestration of cell-surface components, including NF2, LATS2 and Ezrin, modulates the Hippo pathway during cell polarization.
SoxB1 transcription factors are essential for initiating and maintaining neural plate border gene expression
Summary: SoxB1 transcription factors are required for formation of the neural plate border in Xenopus, but then also serve as negative regulators of the transition from a neural plate border to neural crest state.
Mechanisms underlying the direct programming of mouse embryonic fibroblasts to thymic epithelial cells by FOXN1
Summary: A method for programming thymic epithelial cells at the cellular and molecular level reveals how it proceeds, and identifies mechanisms that can be targeted for improving this process.
Natural reversal of cavefish heart asymmetry is controlled by Sonic Hedgehog effects on the left-right organizer
Summary: Natural reversal of cavefish heart asymmetry is controlled by enhanced Sonic Hedgehog signaling at the posterior midline, which modifies left-right organizer function and subsequent dand5 laterality.
Localisation and function of key axonemal microtubule inner proteins and dynein docking complex members reveal extensive diversity among vertebrate motile cilia
Summary: Analysis of the localisation and function of ciliary structural proteins in mouse and zebrafish demonstrates extensive diversity among vertebrate motile cilia.
Destabilization of mRNAs enhances competence to initiate meiosis in mouse spermatogenic cells
Summary: The RNA-binding complex MEIOC-YTHDC2-RBM46 destabilizes its mRNA targets, including transcriptional repressors. This activity facilitates the retinoic acid-dependent activation of Meiosin gene expression and transition into meiosis.
The Hox code responsible for the patterning of the anterior vertebrae in zebrafish
Summary: A loss-of-function study reveals the Hox code responsible for the anterior vertebral identities in zebrafish.
HemK2 functions for sufficient protein synthesis and RNA stability through eRF1 methylation during Drosophila oogenesis
Summary: HemK2 methylates eRF1 release factor not only for protein synthesis but also for RNA stability in Drosophila oogenesis to ensure efficient egg production.
TECHNIQUES AND RESOURCES
A deep learning-based toolkit for 3D nuclei segmentation and quantitative analysis in cellular and tissue context
Summary: This paper reports computational tools that allow versatile and accurate 3D nuclear segmentation in plant organs, enable the analysis of cell-nucleus geometric relationships, and improve the accuracy of 3D cell segmentation.
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.
