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Reposted by Gareth Moore

Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

🧬 VGZT Season 8 is starting soon! Check out our 2026 speaker lineup and save the dates for exciting developmental biology talks from around the world. 🌍🤩 Keep an eye on this channel for speaker spotlights and details about each talk! See you all soon! #devbio #gastrulation #cells #models

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

🧬✨ VGZT SEASON 8 IS HERE! ✨🧬 Calling all developmental biology enthusiasts 👀 A new season of Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks is officially underway, and we have an exciting speaker line-up coming your way! Check out the poster below for everything coming up in Season 8! 👇 #devbio#gastrulation#sci

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Anestis Tsakiridis @tsakiridis.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

We have an opening for a Medical Research Council-funded, 3-year research assistant post in my lab to contribute to our efforts to develop a cell therapy against Hirschsprung disease. Closing date=15/9, for more details check the application portal: jobsite.sheffield.ac.uk/job/Research...

jobsite.sheffield.ac.uk

Research Assistant (Stem Cell Biology)

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Kristina Stapornwongkul @kstapornwongkul.bsky.social · 06/08/2026

First published teamwork of the lab 🎉! We wrote a review about emerging concepts of how metabolism promotes, regulates and changes during gastrulation. We hope it will be useful for anyone interested in the emerging field of developmental metabolism. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

sciencedirect.com

A metabolic view of gastrulation: Coordinating signalling, epigenetics and morphogenesis

Gastrulation is the morphogenetic process by which the single-layered pluripotent epiblast is reorganised into the three germ layers and the basic bod…

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Marina B. Cuenca @cuencam15.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

Sad to be saying goodbye to Drosophila, but excited to get this work out on bioRxiv! If you are interested in the interplay of tissue flows and cool ways to mess them up, this read is for you :) Thanks to colleagues and co-authors! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

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Scott Wilcockson @wilcocksonscott.bsky.social · 24/07/2026

I am very excited to announce that I will be starting my own group at @manchester.ac.uk in January 2027 thanks to a Wellcome Career Development Award 🥳

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Jesse Veenvliet @jesseveenvliet.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

Closing session of @vgzt2021.bsky.social today with the always awesome speaker Cassandra Extavour! Don’t miss this!!

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

Final VGZT seminar of the season! 🎉 We're delighted to welcome Cassandra Extavour for our rescheduled keynote lecture: "One, two, three: evolution of developmental counting mechanisms" 🗓️ Thursday, July 23rd  ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST We look forward to seeing you there! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

🚀 Tomorrow is keynote day at VGZT! Don't miss Jennifer Nichols presenting: "Embryos, stem cells and gastruloid manipulation" See you tomorrow! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

Join us next week for the Western VGZT keynote! 🎉 We're excited to welcome Jennifer Nichols for a keynote lecture: “Embryos, stem cells and gastruloid manipulation” 🗓️ Thursday, July 16th  ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST See you there! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

Final Eastern VGZT session of the season! ☀️ Join us for the keynote by Thomas Lecuit (@thomaslecuit.bsky.social)! “The interplay between geometry and mechanics during Drosophila gastrulation” 🗓️ Wednesday, July 8th ⏰ 9:00 BST / 10:00 CEST / 13:30 IST / 17:00 JST / 18:00 AEST See you there! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

Exciting VGZT session this week! 🎉 🗓️ Thursday, July 2nd ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST Our speakers are: 👉 Silvia Santos (@santoslab.bsky.social) 👉 Diana Pinheiro (@dianapinheiro.bsky.social) See you there! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 15/06/2026

This week, we're excited to welcome Hannah Long to VGZT! ✨ 🗓️ Thursday, June 18th ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST Our speaker: 👉 Hannah Long (@hannahlong.bsky.social) See you there! 👋

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 12/06/2026

So well deserved Lilli 🥳 We’ll miss you in the lab so glad you will not be too far away!

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

We're excited to welcome Liangwen Zhong to this week's VGZT session! ✨ 🗓️ Thursday, June 4th ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST Our speakers is 👉 Liangwen Zhong (@liangwenzhong.bsky.social) See you there! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 19/05/2026

Don’t miss this week’s VGZT session! 🤩 🗓️ Thursday, May 21st ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST Our speakers are 👉 Soham Basu (@sohambasu.bsky.social) 👉 Anestis Tsakiridis (@tsakiridis.bsky.social) See you there! 👋

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Nicoletta Petridou @nicolettapetridou.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

Glad to see this out in its final form! www.nature.com/articles/s41... What changed since the preprint? Wonderful experiments disentangling the effect of receptor binding vs tissue porosity on Nodal diffusion, plus one of the smoothest review experiences! Thanks @natcellbio.nature.com & reviewers 🙏

nature.com

Tissue rigidity phase transition shapes morphogen gradients - Nature Cell Biology

Autorino et al. report a feedback loop between Nodal signalling and tissue phase transitions in zebrafish embryos. Nodal alters adhesion, triggering tissue rigidification and reduced porosity, which l...

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

Eastern VGZT returns next week with two exciting talks! ☀️ 🗓️ Wednesday, May 13th ⏰ 9:00 BST / 10:00 CEST / 13:30 IST / 17:00 JST / 18:00 AEST Don’t miss: 👉 Clare Buckley (@buckleylab.bsky.social) 👉 Mel White (@melaniedwhite.bsky.social) See you there! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 04/05/2026

Exciting VGZT session this week! 🎉 🗓️ Thursday, May 7th ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST Our speakers are 👉 Rui Yan 👉 Bruno Vellutini (@bruvellu.bsky.social) See you there! 👋

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Thanks to the reviewers for the robust process that really strengthened the work. A massive thank you to all the great folks in Manchester @mcf-uom.bsky.social, especially the fantastic Raluca, and to my PhD supervisors Clair and @hilaryashe.bsky.social for their invaluable support and mentorship!

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

For more detail on what we did and what we think it means, please check out the paper which is part of the Development special issue on the extracellular environment! #DevSIextracellular (10/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

This underscores the importance cross-species studies. If we hadn’t exploited the power of Drosophila genetics, we wouldn’t have observed the avidity effect thanks to the protostome-specific Tsg tail! (9/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

To answer this, we had to look to the past! Phylogenetics reveals protostome (including fly) Tsg sequences have a C-terminal ‘tail’. Importantly, we show that the Tsg tail also binds Sog, acting as a weak secondary interaction which is augmented by avidity to rescue the L100A mutant! (8/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

This led us to conclude that ternary complex assembly is driven by an avidity effect; where one binding event makes a second more likely. As (A) BMP, (B) Chordin/Sog, and (C) Tsg all bind each other, the binding of A+B and A+C increases the affinity of B+C. But how does this work? (7/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Puzzled by this we tested the effect of the mutation on Tsg-Sog and Tsg-Sog-BMP complex formation. This showed that while mutant Tsg failed to bind Sog, the presence of the BMP ligand partially recovered the interaction – explaining the minimal impact on in vivo patterning. (6/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

However, mutating the key Chordin/Sog binding leucine (L100A) in Drosophila Tsg led to a surprisingly mild impact on BMP gradient formation! (5/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

To test this functionally, we used Drosophila. In the embryo, Tsg and Sog (fly Chordin) bind BMPs to establish a dorsal-ventral gradient of activity, patterning the embryo. We previously found that abrogating the Tsg-BMP interaction totally disrupted gradient formation. tinyurl.com/33ekw3b7 (4/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Using AlphaFold we modelled the Tsg-Chordin interaction to identify the novel binding mode between the proteins. We validated this model with targeted point mutations, identifying a key amino acid (L103) essential for Tsg binding to a range of Chordin family antagonists. (3/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

BMP ligand movement and activity is controlled in the extracellular space by binding proteins, most famously the antagonist Chordin. Twisted Gastrulation (Tsg), binds both Chordin and BMPs and displays contradictory pro- and anti-BMP actions. So how does Tsg manage this? (2/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Over the moon to see this work from my PhD finally published in Development! Using a combination of structural biology and genetics we identify an avidity-driven mechanism of BMP signal control in the extracellular space. (1/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

For more detail on what we did and what we think it means, please check out the paper which is part of the Development special issue on the extracellular environment! #DevSIextracellular (10/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

However, mutating the key Chordin/Sog binding leucine (L100A) in Drosophila Tsg led to a surprisingly mild impact on BMP gradient formation! (5/11)

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

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Gareth Moore @garethmoore.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Thanks to the reviewers for the robust process that really strengthened the work. A massive thank you to all the great folks in Manchester @mcf-uom.bsky.social , especially the fantastic Raluca, and to my PhD supervisors Clair and @hilaryashe.bsky.social for their invaluable support and mentorship!

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Reposted by Gareth Moore

Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

Two great talks coming up this Thursday at VGZT! 🗓️ Thursday, April 16th ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST Our speakers are 👉 Meng Zhu (@zhumeng123.bsky.social) 👉 Pulin Li (on X: @Pulin_Li) See you on Thursday! 👋

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Alex Neaverson @alexneaverson.bsky.social · 07/04/2026

I illustrated my way through the @bsdb.bsky.social Spring Meeting a couple weeks ago - here's my illustrated summary of the conference! I sketched (almost) all the speakers and glimpses of the science that made it such a great few days.

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

☀️ Join us next week for another great Eastern VGZT session! 🗓️ Wednesday, April 8th ⏰ 9:00 BST / 10:00 CEST / 13:30 IST / 17:00 JST / 18:00 AEST Our speakers are: 👉 Leqian Yu 👉 Tatsuo Shibata See you there! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

⚠️ Update: The VGZT keynote seminar has been postponed Due to unforeseen circumstances, Cassandra Extavour’s keynote will now take place on:  🗓️ Thursday, July 23rd, 2026 We apologize for any inconvenience and look forward to seeing you then! 👋

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Virtual Gastrulation Zoom Talks @vgzt2021.bsky.social · 31/03/2026

We’re excited to announce our 2nd keynote VGZT seminar! Featuring: 👉 Cassandra Extavour "One, two, three: evolution of developmental counting mechanisms" 🗓️ Thursday, April 2nd ⏰ 9:30 PDT / 12:30 EDT / 17:30 BST / 18:30 CEST See you there! 👋

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