A fundamental role for division orientation in progenitor output driving cortical and retinal growth is revealed.

Experiments on the embryonic chick brain reveal distinct directional growth patterns and a tripartite hypothalamus, challenging the classic segmented prosomere model and offering an updated view of ho...

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...

Temporal patterning of retinal progenitor cells governs the sequential generation of retinal cell types, with gliogenesis occurring late in development. Sox8 and Sox9, members of the SoxE transcription factor family, are highly expressed in late-stage retinal progenitor cells and mature Müller glia, yet their functional roles remain incompletely defined. Here we employed gain- and loss-of-function approaches, single-cell multiomic profiling, and injury models to investigate Sox8/9 function. Overexpression of SOX8 and/or SOX9 in early-stage retinal progenitor cells suppressed early-born cell fates and promoted photoreceptor generation, consistent with a role in late-stage temporal identity. Conversely, conditional deletion of Sox8 and/or Sox9 in late-stage progenitors did not impair Müller glia specification, but caused radial displacement of Müller glia nuclei into the outer retina and modest changes in glial gene expression. Loss of Sox8/9 in mature Müller glia modestly increased proliferation post-injury without inducing neurogenic competence. These findings suggest that Sox8/9 are dispensable for gliogenesis and repression of neurogenic competence, but are essential for proper laminar positioning and maturation of retinal Müller glia. ### Competing Interest Statement S.B. is a cofounder, shareholder, and scientific advisory board member of CDI Labs LLC, and receives research support from Genentech. National Eye Institute, https://ror.org/03wkg3b53, R01EY036173

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Nature Communications - Experiments on the embryonic chick brain reveal distinct directional growth patterns and a tripartite hypothalamus, challenging the classic segmented prosomere model and...

Nature - The inability of intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cells to shift the circadian clock in the suprachiasmatic nucleus during daytime is caused by light-dependent depolarization...

Experiments on the embryonic chick brain reveal distinct directional growth patterns and a tripartite hypothalamus, challenging the classic segmented prosomere model and offering an updated view of ho...

A Q&A on genetics and human evolution with Barbara Molz

Loss of function of Ptbp1 in retinal progenitors leads to changes in RNA splicing but does not affect neurogenesis and cell fate specification.

The vertebrate retina serves as a model for studying neurogenesis and cell fate specification, with retinal progenitor cells following a tightly regulated temporal sequence to generate distinct cell t...

Axolotls can regenerate optic nerves, retinas, and parts of their brain. Provost's Undergraduate Research Award-winner Ted Chor wants to understand how.

Biological age is a major risk factor in the development of common degenerative retinal diseases such as age-related macular degeneration and glaucoma. To systematically characterize molecular mechani...

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Sleep pressure, the accumulating drive towards sleep during wakefulness, is shaped by Lhx6-positive GABAergic neurons in the zona incerta (ZI). Here, we show that these neurons are broadly activated b...

The RNA-binding protein Ptbp1 has been proposed as a master regulator of neuronal fate, repressing neurogenesis through its effects on alternative splicing and miRNA maturation. While prior studies us...

Postdoctoral Researcher in Single-Cell Genomics through the NORPOD program

Prolonged wakefulness leads to persistent, deep recovery sleep (RS). However, the neuronal circuits that mediate this process remain elusive. From a circuit screen in mice, we identified a group of th...

Kim et al. map gene regulatory networks of the developing mouse hypothalamus and prethalamus using single-cell multiomics, identifying regulators of regionalization and neurogenesis. They further show...

The vertebrate retina serves as a model for studying neurogenesis and cell fate specification, with retinal progenitor cells following a tightly regulated temporal sequence to generate distinct cell t...

An NIH insider explains what Republicans are likely to do next, and what we can do

The hypothalamic radial-glia-like tanycyte population plays important and intertwined roles in feeding and metabolism, reproduction, and seasonality. Although these processes are circadian-regulated a...

Evolutionary adaptation to diurnal vision in ground squirrels has led to the development of a cone-dominant retina, in stark contrast to the rod-dominant retinas of most mammals. The molecular mechani...

While sleep deprivation broadly disrupts health and well-being, the neural and molecular mechanisms that signal increased sleep pressure remain poorly understood. A key obstacle to progress is the fac...

We find that, in mice, although the individual loss of Parkin or OMA1 does not affect mitochondrial integrity, their combined loss results in small body size, low locomotor activity, premature death, ...

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In the three weeks since President Trump took office and gave Elon Musk free rein inside the federal government, millions of calls have poured in to members of Congress, jamming the system.