Tenure Track Investigator, Reproductive and Developmental Biology Laboratory, Division of Intramural Research The Reproductive and Developmental Biology Laboratory (RDBL) within the Division of Intramural Research of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), part of the National Institu...

Come and be my neighbor and work in our fantastic branch at NIEHS! :) Let me know if you have any questions, happy to assist.

www.niehs.nih.gov/careers/jobs...

Last month at the Trainee Journal Club Ryan shared his research and valuable insights into the publishing process - from selecting a journal to navigating reviewer feedback. It was so engaging and informative! I highly recommend this event to all trainees. Be sure to register for the next session!

Male fertility is independent of Enh13 control of Sox9 testicular expression www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.02...

Hybrid female sterility due to cohesin protection errors in mouse oocytes Misregulation of chromosome cohesion during female meiosis serves as a reproductive isolating barrier in mice.

Another announcement! 📣 Our work on hybrid incompatibility in cohesin protection in 🐭oocytes is published!! Congrats Warif El Yakoubi and Eddie Pan!!🎉 We found hybrids with cohesion errors in two distinct genus.
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Such a fun project interviewing Teresa with Shuo at the SSR annual meeting last summer for the CGH Award- an incredibly well-deserved honor reflecting her impact in the field! We added some this or that questions at the end- listen through to find out if Teresa’s favorite color is 💜 or 💚😉😉

Thank you to @ssrwinrs.bsky.social for featuring our work! Excited to apply the multiome to study the transcriptional regulatory networks driving ovarian lineage specification, follicle formation and development 🤩

Please help share and encourage trainees to attend!! SSR is launching a new initiative where trainee first authors share their recently published work and discuss their publishing experiences. I’ll be moderating the first session, presented by my colleague and friend Ryan from NIEHS 🤩

How Stowers Scientists Found the DNA Site Where Robertsonian Chromosomes Fuse YouTube video by Stowers Institute for Medical Research

🚂 The T2T train keeps rolling: "The formation and propagation of human Robertsonian chromosomes" with Gerton and Garrison labs is out! What's a Robertsonian chromosome? Let Jen tell you herself in this great video, or read our paper: [1/3]
📺 youtu.be/JmlY5omxQVc
📄 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Efficient stem cell-derived mouse embryo models for environmental studies - PubMed Blastoids are stem cell-derived structures that mimic natural blastocysts by incorporating all three lineages: trophectoderm, epiblast, and primitive endoderm. However, current methods often yield inc...

Here are the curated lists of pubs in the #PlacentalCellBio
@biomednews.bsky.social report from the last two weeks!

biomed.news/bims-placeb/...
biomed.news/bims-placeb/...

My personal choice: this resource from the Zernicka-Goetz's lab! pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40882624/

Enjoy!

Excited to share the first review from our lab!
Together with Sara Pietroforte, we explore the idea that, beyond hormonal and biochemical cues, folliculogenesis may also be shaped by mechanical inputs from the ovary.
1/3

Liver-specific loss of Atg9a perturbs lipid metabolism and hepatocyte integrity The autophagy-related protein ATG9A is integral to cellular autophagy and lipid mobilization, yet its importance in mammalian physiology remains underexplored. Using a liver-specific conditional At...

Excited to share the first paper from the lab! 🥳 The ATG9 and lipid droplets saga continues! Open source!

Fragile Nucleosome Fall Seminars: September 10 Grace Bower, Kvon Lab @ UC Irvine, USA Jennifer Phillips-Cremins, UPenn, USA September 24 Ali Wilkening, Sanulli Lab @ Stanford, USA Juanma Schvartzman, Columbia University, USA October 8 Sanim Rahman, Greenberg Lab @ UPenn, USA Alex Federation, Talus Bio, USA October 22 Alice Laigle, Croll Lab @ University of Neuchâtel, Switzerland Seungsoo Kim, UC Irvine, USA November 5 Hannah Long, University of Edinburgh, UK Jeff Vierstra, Altius Institute, USA November 19 Ishtiaque Hossain, Pastor Lab @ McGill, Canada Sarah Teichmann, University of Cambridge, UK December 3 María Mariner Faulí, Rada Iglesias Lab @ IBBTEC, Spain Jonathan Henninger, Carnegie Mellon, USA December 17 Rebecca Berrens, Oxford University, UK Jean-Benoit Lalanne, University of Montreal, Canada

We're super excited to announce the entire lineup for the Fall season of Fragile Nucleosome Seminars, starting on Sept 10th at 1200 EDT / 1600 UTC with @gracebower.bsky.social and @creminslab.bsky.social!

register here for the entire series: us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

Such a beautiful ovary from @shmimberly.bsky.social 😍😍

Women’s health: insights in research and inclusion Learn about the history and importance of the gender gap currently impacting women's health sciences - Join us on 28 August

Dr. Francesca Duncan will speak on this virtual webinar on "Women’s health: insights in research and inclusion"

Learn more and register for the event on August 28!
www.chemistryworld.com/webinars/wom...

Pleased to share my new review:

Ovulation: A cellular symphony in three movements 💥🥚

Ovulation is more than egg release—it's a tightly regulated, tissue-scale process. Here, I present a temporal framework structured as a symphony performed by the cells of the follicle.

🔗 doi.org/10.1016/j.se...

❤️❤️❤️

🧵1/
🚨 New tool for reproductive biology!
We generated a Nr2f2-iCreERT2 mouse—an inducible Cre model that specifically targets interstitial cells in both male and female gonads.
Read more in our new @biolreprod paper:
🔗 doi.org/10.1093/biol...

📣 Paper alert!! Excited to share the 2nd research paper from my time in the @bokelab.bsky.social at @crg.eu, out today in the @embojournal.org!

We asked: "how do human oocytes regulate proteostatic organelles under physiological conditions?"

1/

Multinucleated giant cells are hallmarks of ovarian aging with unique immune and degradation-associated molecular signatures Ovarian multinucleated giant cells are a unique macrophage population that arise within the aging mammalian ovary. This study characterizes their transcriptome in mice, uncovering a potential role in ...

New Publication!

Congrats to Dr. Aubrey Converse on her manuscript which uses innovative approaches to define the transcriptomic signature of ovarian multinucleated giant cells and provide novel insight into the role of this cell population in ovarian aging!

journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

Beyond fertility and menopause: See why the ovary is central to women’s health and longevity See why the ovary − often reduced to its reproductive role − menopause, age and estrogen affect a woman’s health throughout her body and lifetime.

Dr. Francesca Duncan and Dr. Kara Goldman were featured in this USA Today on ovarian aging and reproductive longevity!

www.usatoday.com/story/graphi...

Altered cofactor recruitment and nucleosome dynamics underlie bisphenol A’s impact on ERα-mediated transcriptional bursting Biochemistry; Molecular biology; Molecular interaction

Super congrats to Chris and Pelin on this awesome work! First paper from the @joerodriguez11.bsky.social lab🎉!
www.cell.com/iscience/ful...

Short-term moderate caloric restriction in the rhesus macaque attenuates markers of ovarian aging in select populations | Aging Aging | doi:10.18632/aging.206253. Emma S. Gargus, Rhea Sharma, Rebecca Gu, Camille Mulcahy, Brian W. Johnson, Jing Song, Jungwha Lee, Mary Zelinski, Francesca E. Duncan

New Duncan Lab publication!
Congratulations to Emma Gargus and Rhea Sharma and their co-authors on elucidating how caloric restriction impacts markers of ovarian function and aging in the rhesus macaque!

www.aging-us.com/article/2062...

Join SPARK's first panel, Human Biospecimen Repositories Fueling Translational Reproductive Science and Medicine Research.

CRS faculty participants include panelist Dr. Mary Ellen Pavone and moderator Dr. Francesca Duncan

www.upsquad.com/event/regist...

Pioneering new enhancers by GATA3: role of facilitating transcription factors and chromatin remodeling Abstract. Pioneer transcription factors (PTFs) bind to inaccessible chromatin and recruit collaborating transcription factors to promote chromatin accessib

Congrats on the new paper to Krystal who "doesn't do social media" but does do a ton of ATAC and Cut&Run to show how GATA3 pioneers enhancers with BRG1 and sometimes AP-1! #NIEHS #NAR doi.org/10.1093/nar/...

Keystone Symposium - Metabolic and Nutritional Control of Development and Cell Fate - preLights The field of developmental metabolism seeks to understand how nutrient availability and the regulation of metabolic pathways support and influence critical biological processes such as tissue patterni...

Together with @virginiasavy.bsky.social, we curated a preList of preprints presented at the Keystone Symposia: Metabolic and Nutritional Control of Development and Cell Fate!
Explore the latest in the field, fresh from the conference! 📑🆕: prelights.biologists.com/prelists/ksm...
#DevBio #Metabolism

🚨Excited to share my first postdoc paper, now published in Nature Communications! We uncover a key regulator of testis development and its link to differences of sex development (DSD). 🧵
🔗 nature.com/articles/s4146…
1/7

Ready for it???
To all the **sex determination lovers**
📢 Save the date to the 10th International Symposium on the Biology of Vertebrate Sex Determination (VSD) held in the beautiful Hawaii!!
Great community, amazing science, excellent speakers and superb location 🏝
📢 March 23-26, 2026 📢

27th Annual NIEHS Biomedical Career Symposium The annual NIEHS Biomedical Career Symposium, now in its 27th year, is one of the largest assemblies of biomedical organizations and young scientists in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina.

Friends in RTP area exploring biomedical career options don’t miss out on this great (and free) opportunity 🤩🤩 Learn more at bit.ly/4bzNK2s

Hello! Thanks for organizing! May I ask how I can register for the meeting? 😊

📢 #Reproseminars are back!
We are thrilled to kick off the semester on Monday 03/10 with an exciting talk by Dr. @jeanjuchung.bsky.social (@ Yale University) 🧪
💬Title: "Sperm Ca2+ channel research for reproductive medicine"
🕒 3 PM 🇦🇷 | 2 PM 🇺🇸 EST
Join us!