Wee1 opposes APC/C(Cdh1) activity to promote S-phase entry Wee1 phosphorylates and inhibits CDK activity to inhibit mitotic entry and establish a G2 DNA damage checkpoint. Consequently, Wee1 inhibitors are in clinical trials, developed to be synthetically let...

New lab preprint!

We find that Wee1 phosphorylates Cdh1(FZR1) and suppresses APC/C(Cdh1) activity to promote S-phase entry

A fantastic team effort from the combined forces of @lavuillemenot.bsky.social, Lucas Morales, Calin-Mihai Dragoi & Beth Pennycook

www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

Combinatorial BMP4 and activin direct the choice between alternate routes to endoderm in a stem cell model of human gastrulation Inge et al. show that human endoderm originates from two converging developmental routes with distinct dynamics and efficiencies yet similar developmental potential. Combinatorial activin and BMP4 sig...

So exciting to see this in print! Ever wondered how embryonic cells know what (fate) to become during early development? In particular when they might see different signaling cues? We investigated this!

And a lovely cover from Zoe Ruiz and @oliveringe.bsky.social!

www.cell.com/developmenta...

Congrats Sergio! :)

Thanks Julia :)

“This image symbolizes lineage convergence and specification during early human development. The maze represents the diverse trajectories and histories of endoderm cells have before converging to a shared identity.”

Thank you to @cp-devcell.bsky.social for selecting our story to feature on the cover of today’s issue of Developmental Cell!
Thank you to Zoë Ruiz for the wonderful art work! Read more here: www.cell.com/developmenta...

Hierarchical lineage architecture of human and avian spinal cord revealed by single-cell genomic barcoding The formation of neural circuits depends on the precise spatial and temporal organisation of neuronal populations during development. In the vertebrate spinal cord, progenitors are patterned into mole...

Thrilled to share my main postdoc work with @jamesbriscoe.bsky.social

We used genomic barcoding + scRNAseq in chick & human embryos to reveal a lineage architecture that reshapes how we understand neural tube development & cell fate decisions
🧵👇

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Congratulations Giulia! 🙌

We had a blast tonight at the ‘Curious about the Crick’ event showcasing the science in our lab. Lots of enthusiasm and so many interesting questions. Was awesome to share this with my wonderful lab from brainstorming to communicating the science we love. Thank you to @crick.ac.uk for having us

The Crick PhD program is open and there are amazing projects including our lab's. I couldn't recommend enough joining the program: brilliant community and excellent training and mentorship.
Specific project with us will be decided based on your interests.

Apply here www.crick.ac.uk/careers-stud...

Nobel Laureate Professor Sir John Gurdon dies aged 92 It is with great sadness that the University shares the news of the death of Professor Sir John Gurdon, founder of the Gurdon Institute.

Very saddened to hear of John Gurdon’s passing. I’ve been lucky enough to interact with him at multiple points through my career - from undergrad lectures, through his position as former Chair of @biologists.bsky.social’s Board of Directors, and as an author at @dev-journal.bsky.social.

Just over one week until this opportunity closes!

If you’re an ambitious computational scientist looking for a Postdoc position, apply now

🚀 Excited to share scPortrait! Led by Sophia Mädler & Niklas Schmacke w/ the Mann lab — a new @scverse tool for standardized single-cell image data. Enables ML-ready extraction, >1B cell processing, cross-omics, & cancer macrophage insights.
🔗 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Farewell dinner for @oliveringe.bsky.social with our wonderful Santos lab family. Ollie was our 1st Crick PhD student! Lots to celebrate and many fun memories. We are so grateful to have had Ollie in the lab and cannot wait to see what’s next for him in the Morris lab at Harvard! Best of luck,Ollie!

Description Please note that job descriptions are not exhaustive, and you may be asked to take on additional duties that align with the key responsibilities ment...

@mariasecrier.bsky.social & I are looking for an enthusiastic & excellent data scientist for a 4-year postdoc to understand cell cycle dysregulation in cancer.

Deadline 15th October. Get in touch if you have any questions.

Please repost!

More details:
www.imperial.ac.uk/jobs/search-...

HDAC3 prevents enhancer hyperactivation to enable developmental transitions Dynamic gene regulation requires precise cooperation between transcription factors and chromatin modifiers at regulatory elements to achieve not only activation or repression, but also appropriate tra...

Genes are not On/Off switches. In a new preprint we show that HDAC3 is key to establish correct transcriptional dose in development. Gr8 work from N. Stamidis @ucph.bsky.social and collab. @jamiehackett.bsky.social @gregersenlab.bsky.social . Huge thx to all authors! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

From stem cells to human development: supporting a growing field In 2014, Development organised the first of The Company of Biologists’ Journal Meetings: ‘From Stem Cells to Human Development’. Conceived to help bring together the developmental biology and stem cel...

It was fun to look back over a decade of 'From Stem Cells to Human Development' meetings at @dev-journal.bsky.social. This is one of the projects I most enjoyed during my time at the journal - and I really hope we helped to catalyse and support a community... journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...

Gene Network Organization, Mutation, and Selection Collectively Drive Developmental Pattern Evolvability and Predictability The historical order in which mutations appear during evolution determine the evolutionary trajectory of gene regulatory networks and influence how developmental patterns change and diversify over tim...

Fresh from the press💥 We asked what happens when you evolve gene regulatory networks computationally at scale. Do general principles of GRN evolution jump out? Is the process predictable? Read on to find out @prxlife.bsky.social @crick.ac.uk @ucl-ipls.bsky.social 👉 journals.aps.org/prxlife/abst...

This is Mirjam, Santos Lab’ PhD student presenting her work at the EMBL meeting on Developmental Metabolism 🫶. Conference was incredible and Mirjam had an amazing time!

3/3 I will be starting as a postdoc fellow this autumn at @massgeneralbrigham.bsky.social and @harvardmed.bsky.social with Samantha A. Morris.

2/3 Special thank you to my supervisor Silvia, her continued mentorship and support throughout the PhD and onto my next step. 🙏

1/3 After 6+ years at @crick.ac.uk I split my last cells and hung up my lab coat! Thank you to the brilliant community from fellow PhDs/Postdocs, LOAs, STPs, academic training team and to all past/present @santoslab.bsky.social members. My Crick journey would not have been the same without you all!

Drs. @dbenzinger.bsky.social‬ and @jamesbriscoe.bsky.social at the @crick.ac.uk established an #optogenetic system for the precise spatiotemporal control in vitro of Sonic hedgehog morphogen production. 🦔

📄 - https://bit.ly/3Vxf0rf
🎙️ - https://bit.ly/3JWWpT9

Converging development: how cell paths unite in the embryo By tracking the fate of individual embryonic stem cells, researchers have found that endoderm cells – early embryonic cells that give rise to tissues such as the gut and lungs – originate from multipl...

Researchers have found that early embryonic cells start to specialise via converging developmental paths, rather than following linear trajectories as was previously believed.
www.crick.ac.uk/news/2025-09...

7/7 🙏Thank you so much for my brilliant co-authors and collaborators including @eliascopin.bsky.social @borzogharibi.bsky.social @jcornwallscoones.bsky.social @jamesbriscoe.bsky.social and my PhD supervisor @santoslab.bsky.social for helping at each step of the way.

6/7 Overall, this work demonstrates that distinct cell identities can arise through different developmental trajectories coordinated by combinatorial signalling.

5/7 When varying signalling conditions and measuring the proportion of endoderm cells from different paths, we found that the choice between routes to endoderm depends on the specific combination of BMP4 and Activin signals that cells are exposed to ⚖️.

4/7 Despite divergent origins we found that endoderm cells derived from different routes have the same developmental potential to form downstream cell types 🧫.

3/7 🔬Using single-cell transcriptomics as well as live-cell imaging of engineered hESCs, we measured individual gene expression histories and found that human endoderm arises from two distinct developmental trajectories: a direct path and an indirect one through a FOXC1+ progenitor state.

2/7 🔢 Pairing quantitative measurements of cell fate proportions in response to signalling combinations and mathematical modelling we found that hESC differentiation was best captured by cell state transitions including multiple paths to terminal fates.