Issues

Summary: The development of animal embryos is initially directed by maternal gene products. This Review discusses the mechanisms that underlie the handover of developmental control to the zygotic genome during the maternal-to-zygotic transition.

Summary: This Review discusses the mechanisms of early endoderm morphogenesis across different model organisms, highlighting a surprising number of conserved features, including cells undergoing an epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition, collective cell migration and mesenychymal-to-epithelial transitions.

Highlighted Article: Drosophila gonad stem cell niche development is directed to the male or female pathway by the sex-determination factor Doublesex via its downstream target bric a brac.

Summary: Loss-of-function analyses in mice demonstrate a role for Kirrel2 in the coalescence of OSN axons in the DII region of the olfactory bulb and suggest that Kirrel-independent mechanisms contribute to axonal coalescence in the DI region.

Summary: Multiple genome-wide approaches reveal that Npas4l functions as a master regulator by directly inducing a group of transcription factor genes that are crucial for hematoendothelial specification.

Summary: Regulation of reproductive stem elongation in barley by APETALA2 suggests a pivotal role for phase change repression of JA-associated responses to promote internode growth.

Highlighted Article: Reciprocal interactions between BMP-response elements and the cis-regulatory environment control Dpp-dependent transcriptional gene activation in developing Drosophila epithelia.

Highlighted Article: Alcohol exposure in early pregnancy has sex-specific effects on placenta formation and function in the developing rat embryo.

Highlighted Article: V0-ATPase controls a late apical trafficking step involved in the maintenance of the apical absorptive intestinal membrane and its silencing phenocopies microvillus inclusion disease in C. elegans.

Highlighted Article: The independent behavior of extracellular matrix and cell monolayer of an epithelium under tension during Drosophila leg development highlights the interplay between tissue mechanics and cell-matrix coupling.