Issues

Summary: This Meeting Review summarises the key advances presented at The Notch IX meeting, which was held in Athens, Greece, in October 2015.

Summary: This Review highlights the molecular mechanisms of stomach development and discusses recent findings regarding stomach stem cells and organoid cultures, and their roles in investigating stomach diseases.

Summary: The entire spermatogenesis process is successfully recapitulated in culture using zebrafish testicular hyperplasias that accumulate early stage spermatogonia.

Highlighted article: LGN inactivation in mice disrupts spindle orientation in both the retina and neocortex but leads to very different outcomes with regards to cell fate in each context.

Summary: SDF1/CXCR4 signaling lies downstream of Tbx1 during pharyngeal neural crest development, and inactivating CXCR4 causes defects that phenocopy the human DiGeorge syndrome.

Summary: Endothelial cells produce Sema3A, a known axon repellent, that exerts repelling functions on VEGF-A-induced tip cell filopodia during angiogenesis in mice.

Highlighted article: A comparison of Six2/SIX2 regulatory targets in mouse and human nephron progenitors reveals that Six1/SIX1 is differentially regulated and expressed between the two species.

Highlighted article: The cannabinoid receptors Cnr1 and Cnr2 are required for normal hepatocyte proliferation and differentiation during zebrafish development, and for normal liver metabolism in adult zebrafish.

Highlighted article: Time-lapse imaging studies to follow cell behavior and dynamics in Drosophila epithelia reveal mechanical roles for tumor suppressors and proto-oncogenes.

Summary: The developmental potential of embryos fertilized with sperm from germline-specific Dicer or Drosha conditional knockout mice is impaired, highlighting key roles for paternal miRNAs/endo-siRNAs.

Summary: During bone formation in neonatal mice, chondrocytic expression of the receptor tyrosine kinase Ephrin B2 regulates cartilage degradation and subsequent osteoclastic destruction of the cartilage matrix.

Summary: The absence of dystrophin in human fetal muscle alters IP3 signaling pathways and consequently causes a delay in myogenesis and myofiber commitment.

Summary: During tooth development in mice, FGF-dependent vertical cell divisions thicken the tooth placode while Shh drives cell rearrangements that cause invagination.

Summary: The transcription factor NFL acts via the GA pathway and is necessary for promoting flowering in Arabidopsis under non-inductive short-day conditions.

Summary: Analyses of the mDA neuron marker genes Pitx3 and Aldh1a1 in chick and mouse suggest important differences in how mDA neurons are generated in these species.

Summary: A screen identifies skeletal patterning factors, including a sulfate transporter, and suggests that ventral proteoglycan sulfation acts as a positional cue during sea urchin skeletal patterning.

Summary: The analysis of actomyosin and C-cadherin dynamics in Xenopus embryos suggests a multistep model to explain how cell intercalation can occur against a force gradient to drive axial extension.