{"title":"Chicken embryo cultures in the dorsal-upward orientation for the manipulation of epiblasts","authors":"Kaho Konya, Yusaku Watanabe, Akihito Kawamura, Kae Nakamura, Hideaki Iida, Koya Yoshihi, Hisato Kondoh","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12943","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12943","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Chicken embryos have many advantages in the study of amniote embryonic development. In particular, culture techniques developed for early-stage embryos have promoted the advancement of modern developmental studies using chicken embryos. However, the standard technique involves placing chicken embryos in the ventral-upward (ventral-up) orientation, limiting manipulation of the epiblast at the dorsal surface, which is the primary source of ectodermal and mesodermal tissues. To circumvent this limitation, we developed chicken embryo cultures in the dorsal-up orientation and exploited this technique to address diverse issues. In this article, we first review the history of chicken embryo culture techniques to evaluate the advantages and limitations of the current standard technique. Then, the dorsal-up technique is discussed. These technological discussions are followed by three different examples of experimental analyses using dorsal-up cultures to illustrate their advantages: (1) EdU labeling of epiblast cells to assess potential variation in the cell proliferation rate; (2) migration behaviors of N1 enhancer-active epiblast cells revealed by tracking cells with focal fluorescent dye labeling in dorsal-up embryo culture; and (3) neural crest development of mouse neural stem cells in chicken embryos.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 8","pages":"426-434"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-09-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dgd.12943","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142257501","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Meeting report of the 57th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society for Developmental Biologists","authors":"Yuzuka Takeuchi","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12941","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12941","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The 57th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society for Developmental Biologists was held at Miyako Messe and ROHM Theater Kyoto from June 19 to 22, 2024. After the COVID-19 pandemic, this was the first meeting where all restrictions were removed. This year's theme was “Breaking Through Boundaries.” It was set to be enjoyed by everyone across academic fields and nationalities. About 600 people from 16 countries participated in this meeting. Four workshops, 117 posters, 16 oral sessions (80 titles), 7 symposia, 2 plenary lectures, and various other formats ware included. I would like to share some of the lively discussions and wonderful sessions that I attended.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 7","pages":"381-383"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-09-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142200294","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Development of specialized devices for microbial experimental evolution","authors":"Atsushi Shibai, Chikara Furusawa","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12940","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12940","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Experimental evolution of microbial cells provides valuable information on evolutionary dynamics, such as mutations that contribute to fitness gain under given selection pressures. Although experimental evolution is a promising tool in evolutionary biology and bioengineering, long-term culture experiments under multiple environmental conditions often impose an excessive workload on researchers. Therefore, the development of automated systems significantly contributes to the advancement of experimental evolutionary research. This review presents several specialized devices designed for experimental evolution studies, such as an automated system for high-throughput culture experiments, a culture device that generate a temperature gradient, and an automated ultraviolet (UV) irradiation culture device. The ongoing development of such specialized devices is poised to continually expand new frontiers in experimental evolution research.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 7","pages":"372-380"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dgd.12940","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142074475","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The self-in-the-world map emerged in the primate brain as a basis for Homo sapiens abilities","authors":"Rafael Bretas, Banty Tia, Atsushi Iriki","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12939","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12939","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The brain in the genus <i>Homo</i> expanded rapidly during evolution, accelerated by a reciprocated interaction between neural, cognitive, and ecological niches (triadic niche construction, or TNC). This biologically costly expansion incubated latent cognitive capabilities that, with a quick and inexpensive rewiring of brain areas in a second phase of TNC, provided the basis for <i>Homo sapiens</i> specific abilities. The neural demands for perception of the human body in interaction with tools and the environment required highly integrated sensorimotor domains, inducing the parietal lobe expansion seen in humans. These newly expanded brain areas allowed connecting the sensations felt in the body to the actions in the world through the cognitive function of “projection”. In this opinion article, we suggest that as a relationship of equivalence between body parts, tools and their external effects was established, mental mechanisms of self-objectification might have emerged as described previously, grounding notions of spatial organization, idealized objects, and their transformations, as well as socio-emotional states in the sensing agent through a <i>self-in-the-world map</i>. Therefore, human intelligence and its features such as symbolic thought, language, mentalizing, and complex technical and social behaviors could have stemmed from the explicit awareness of the causal relationship between the self and intentional modifications to the environment.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 6","pages":"342-348"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-08-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dgd.12939","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141903468","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Endothelial cell transitions in zebrafish vascular development","authors":"Li-Kun Phng, Benjamin M. Hogan","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12938","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12938","url":null,"abstract":"<p>In recent decades, developmental biologists have come to view vascular development as a series of progressive transitions. Mesoderm differentiates into endothelial cells; arteries, veins and lymphatic endothelial cells are specified from early endothelial cells; and vascular networks diversify and invade developing tissues and organs. Our understanding of this elaborate developmental process has benefitted from detailed studies using the zebrafish as a model system. Here, we review a number of key developmental transitions that occur in zebrafish during the formation of the blood and lymphatic vessel networks.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 6","pages":"357-368"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-07-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dgd.12938","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141769928","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Zebrafish trpm7 mutants show reduced motility in free movement","authors":"Kenta Watai, Kenichiro Sadamitsu, Seiji Wada, Makoto Kashima, Hiromi Hirata","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12937","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12937","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Parkinson's disease is a neurological disorder characterized by reduced motility, depression and dementia. Guamanian parkinsonism dementia with amyotrophic sclerosis is a local case of Parkinson's disease reported in the Western Pacific Islands of Guam and Rota as well as in the Kii Peninsula of Japan. A previous genetic study has suggested that Guamanian parkinsonism is attributable to a variant of the <i>TRPM7</i> gene, which encodes for melastatin-related transient receptor potential (TRP) ion channels. But the link between parkinsonism and the <i>TRPM7</i> gene remains elusive. Previous studies have addressed that <i>trpm7</i>-deficient zebrafish embryos showed defects in pigmentation and touch-evoked motor response. In this study, we identified a new viable allele of <i>trpm7</i> mutant causing an I756N amino acid substitution in the first transmembrane domain. Behavioral analyses revealed that <i>trpm7</i> mutants showed compromised motility with their movement distance shorter than wild-type larvae. The velocity of the movement was significantly reduced in <i>trpm7</i> mutants than in wild-type larvae. Along with a previous finding of reduced dopaminergic neurons in zebrafish <i>trpm7</i> mutants, reduced motility of <i>trpm7</i> mutants can suggest another similarity between <i>trpm7</i> phenotypes and Parkinson's disease symptoms.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 6","pages":"349-356"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-07-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141545503","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Differential cellular stiffness across tissues that contribute to Xenopus neural tube closure","authors":"Makoto Suzuki, Naoko Yasue, Naoto Ueno","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12936","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12936","url":null,"abstract":"<p>During the formation of the neural tube, the primordium of the vertebrate central nervous system, the actomyosin activity of cells in different regions drives neural plate bending. However, how the stiffness of the neural plate and surrounding tissues is regulated and mechanically influences neural plate bending has not been elucidated. Here, we used atomic force microscopy to reveal the relationship between the stiffness of the neural plate and the mesoderm during <i>Xenopus</i> neural tube formation. Measurements with intact embryos revealed that the stiffness of the neural plate was consistently higher compared with the non-neural ectoderm and that it increased in an actomyosin activity-dependent manner during neural plate bending. Interestingly, measurements of isolated tissue explants also revealed that the relationship between the stiffness of the apical and basal sides of the neural plate was reversed during bending and that the stiffness of the mesoderm was lower than that of the basal side of the neural plate. The experimental elevation of mesoderm stiffness delayed neural plate bending, suggesting that low mesoderm stiffness mechanically supports neural tube closure. This study provides an example of mechanical interactions between tissues during large-scale morphogenetic movements.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 5","pages":"320-328"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-06-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dgd.12936","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141460539","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A novel preparation for histological analyses of intraventricular macrophages in the embryonic brain","authors":"Futoshi Murayama, Hisa Asai, Arya Kirone Patra, Hiroaki Wake, Takaki Miyata, Yuki Hattori","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12935","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12935","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Microglia colonize the brain starting on embryonic day (E) 9.5 in mice, and their population increases with development. We have previously demonstrated that some microglia are derived from intraventricular macrophages, which frequently infiltrate the pallium at E12.5. To address how the infiltration of intraventricular macrophages is spatiotemporally regulated, histological analyses detecting how these cells associate with the surrounding cells at the site of infiltration into the pallial surface are essential. Using two-photon microscopy-based in vivo imaging, we demonstrated that most intraventricular macrophages adhere to the ventricular surface. This is a useful tool for imaging intraventricular macrophages maintaining their original position, but this method cannot be used for observing deeper brain regions. Meanwhile, we found that conventional cryosection-based and naked pallial slice-based observation resulted in unexpected detachment from the ventricular surface of intraventricular macrophages and their mislocation, suggesting that previous histological analyses might have failed to determine their physiological number and location in the ventricular space. To address this, we sought to establish a methodological preparation that enables us to delineate the structure and cellular interactions when intraventricular macrophages infiltrate the pallium. Here, we report that brain slices pretreated with agarose-embedding maintained adequate density and proper positioning of intraventricular macrophages on the ventricular surface. This method also enabled us to perform the immunostaining. We believe that this is helpful for conducting histological analyses to elucidate the mechanisms underlying intraventricular macrophage infiltration into the pallium and their cellular properties, leading to further understanding of the process of microglial colonization into the developing brain.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 5","pages":"329-337"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-06-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dgd.12935","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141421768","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"An analysis of semaphorin-mediated cellular interactions in the Caenorhabditis elegans epidermis using the IR-LEGO single-cell gene induction system","authors":"Motoshi Suzuki, Shin Takagi","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12925","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12925","url":null,"abstract":"<p>One of the major functions of the semaphorin signaling system is the regulation of cell shape. In the nematode <i>Caenorhabditis elegans</i>, membrane-bound semaphorins SMP-1/2 (SMPs) regulate the morphology of epidermal cells via their receptor plexin, PLX-1. In the larval male tail of the SMP-PLX-1 signaling mutants, the border between two epidermal cells, R1.p and R2.p, is displaced anteriorly, resulting in the anterior displacement of the anterior-most ray, ray 1, in the adult male. To elucidate how the intercellular signaling mediated by SMPs regulates the position of the intercellular border, we performed mosaic gene expression analyses by using infrared laser-evoked gene operator (IR-LEGO). We show that PLX-1 expressed in R1.p and SMP-1 expressed in R2.p are required for the proper positioning of ray 1. The result suggests that SMP signaling promotes extension, rather than retraction, of R1.p. This is in contrast to a previous finding that SMPs mediate inhibition of cell extension of vulval precursor cells, another group of epidermal cells of <i>C. elegans</i>, indicating the context dependence of cell shape control via the semaphorin signaling system.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 5","pages":"308-319"},"PeriodicalIF":1.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dgd.12925","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140960844","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Assembly of continuous high-resolution draft genome sequence of Hemicentrotus pulcherrimus using long-read sequencing","authors":"Tetsushi Komoto, Kazuho Ikeo, Shunsuke Yaguchi, Takashi Yamamoto, Naoaki Sakamoto, Akinori Awazu","doi":"10.1111/dgd.12924","DOIUrl":"10.1111/dgd.12924","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The update of the draft genome assembly of sea urchin, <i>Hemicentrotus pulcherrimus</i>, which is widely studied in East Asia as a model organism of early development, was performed using Oxford nanopore long-read sequencing. The updated assembly provided ~600-Mb genome sequences divided into 2,163 contigs with N50 = 516 kb. BUSCO completeness score and transcriptome model mapping ratio (TMMR) of the present assembly were obtained as 96.5% and 77.8%, respectively. These results were more continuous with higher resolution than those by the previous version of <i>H. pulcherrimus</i> draft genome, HpulGenome_v1, where the number of scaffolds = 16,251 with a total of ~100 Mb, N50 = 143 kb, BUSCO completeness score = 86.1%, and TMMR = 55.4%. The obtained genome contained 36,055 gene models that were consistent with those in other echinoderms. Additionally, two tandem repeat sequences of early histone gene locus containing 47 copies and 34 copies of all histone genes, and 185 of the homologous sequences of the interspecifically conserved region of the <i>Ars</i> insulator, ArsInsC, were obtained. These results provide further advance for genome-wide research of development, gene regulation, and intranuclear structural dynamics of multicellular organisms using <i>H. pulcherrimus</i>.</p>","PeriodicalId":50589,"journal":{"name":"Development Growth & Differentiation","volume":"66 4","pages":"297-304"},"PeriodicalIF":2.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dgd.12924","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140623871","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}