The study of how organisms grow and develop from fertilization to maturity, including embryogenesis, morphogenesis, cell differentiation, pattern formation, stem cell biology, and regeneration
6 papersThis study used a new method called HisTrac-seq to track how mouse embryonic stem cells change their identity when developing into brain cells in a dish. They found many cells unexpectedly switched their specialization, termed "identity jumps", due to early activation of maturation programs. This suggests cells have a hidden ability to change their fate during development.
The study found that cellular senescence in the endometrium plays a key role in human embryo implantation, with senescent cells creating a dynamic environment that allows for embryo expansion and attachment. However, excessive or absent senescence can lead to implantation failure or early pregnancy loss, as demonstrated in a 3D endometrial model using human embryos.
Songbird vocal circuits, despite residing in a structure not found in mammals, contain neurons with gene expression profiles remarkably similar to those in the mammalian neocortex. However, these neurons are organized differently and show greater regulatory gene expression similarity to neurons in the mammalian ventral pallium, suggesting a distinct evolutionary origin but convergent evolution of functional cell types.
Truncating variants in SRCAP outside the Floating-Harbor syndrome (FLHS) locus cause a distinct neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by developmental delay, behavioral problems, and musculoskeletal issues. These individuals exhibit a unique DNA methylation signature that distinguishes them from FLHS, supporting the classification of this condition as a separate entity called non-FLHS SRCAP-related NDD.
Acoustic communication in terrestrial vertebrates is significantly associated with nocturnal activity, supporting the idea that sound evolved for communication in the dark. Despite its role in speciation in some clades, acoustic communication does not appear to increase overall diversification rates across tetrapods. The trait shows strong phylogenetic conservation, with independent origins in major groups around 100-200 million years ago.
This paper introduces a set of computational methods using unsupervised latent models to analyze animal vocalizations, projecting them into low-dimensional feature spaces learned from spectrograms. These methods reveal features like individual and species identity, geographic variation, and sequential organization across diverse species, offering new insights into animal communication and demonstrating the potential of latent models for comparative analyses and hypothesis testing.