Kathryn Anderson is Professor and Chair of the Developmental Biology Program at the Sloan Kettering Institute in New York. Her lab investigates the genetic networks underlying the patterning and morphogenesis of the early mouse embryo. We caught up with Kathryn at the 2016 Society for Developmental Biology – International Society of Differentiation joint meeting in Boston, where she was awarded the Edwin G. Conklin medal.
The morphogenesis of tissues in animal development is orchestrated by intercellular signalling and executed by cell behaviours such as changes to shape. Understanding the link between signalling and cell shape changes is a key task of developmental biology. This work addresses this problem using the development of the pupal wing of Drosophila melanogaster. The pupal wing is a bilayered epithelium which is patterned into vein and intervein domains, and which secretes the cuticle of the adult wing. I first address the cellular basis of pupal wing development, and show that the process comprises a series of dynamic cell shape changes involving alterations to the apical and basolateral surfaces of the cells. Using temporally controlled mis-expression, I then investigate the role of intercellular signalling in these shape changes, and define the competence of cells in the wing to respond to ectopic signals. The dimensions of signalling in the pupal wing are then investigated, and I show that while BMP ligands can travel between the layers to promote vein development, such signalling is not a prerequisite for cellular differentiation. Within the plane of the epithelium, the BMP ligand Dpp can only induce signalling at a short range, potentially due to the upregulation of receptor levels in receiving cells. Finally, attention is turned to the means by which cell signalling controls cell shape changes, specifically in the crossveins. I identify the RhoGAP Cv-c as a downstream target of BMP signalling which acts to inhibit a novel RhoGTPase function in intervein development. This provides an example of how signalling pathways can enact cell shape changes, via the transcriptional regulation of RhoGAPs.
Jim Smith is Director of Science at the Wellcome Trust and a group leader at the Francis Crick Institute, where he was formerly Director of Research. A Fellow of both the Royal Society and the Academy of Medical Sciences, he was knighted for his services to medical research and science education in 2016. His lab works on mesoderm induction in the early vertebrate embryo. We met Jim in the Crick to hear about his life in science, his visions for the Crick and the Wellcome Trust, and his advice for early career scientists.
In 2009, we asked our authors and readers for feedback on how the journal was doing and for suggestions of new ways we could serve and support the community. Many responses concerned our rather limited online presence. Our website, for instance, was deemed outdated, and so in January 2010 we relaunched it with a new design and improved navigation. But there were also calls to think about doing something different: could we create an online space for the global developmental biology community to interact, exchange ideas, advertise positions and events, and so on? Nothing like it existed at the time, and the idea seemed timely. As a community journal, Development was also well-placed to host such a site, and so we decided to go ahead with the project, with new Editor in Chief Olivier Pourquié at the helm. Funding from our publisher, The Company of Biologists, allowed us to develop and market the site, and to hire a dedicated website Community Manager, Eva Amsen, to run it. And so, in June 2010, the Node (thenode.biologists.com) went live. Named both after a connection point in a network and an eminent embryonic organiser, the Node would be a ‘community-based, one-stop shop for developmental biologists’ (Amsen et al., 2010).In the decade since launch, although the Node has undergone a couple of redesigns and added some new features, the format and functionality has stayed the same: a blog (with newest posts appearing at the top of the homepage), a jobs board and an events calendar. It's perhaps still under-appreciated that anyone can contribute to the Node: all you have to do is register for an account and start posting. Any moderation by the Community Manager is ‘post-publication’, although of course we're happy to provide feedback on drafts. Readers can also comment on and rate posts. The Node is intended to be your site – a place where anyone in the community can post on any topic of relevance.Blog posts (of which there have been 2488 so far) have covered everything from meeting reports to research highlights, image competitions to topical discussions, career stories to society calls. They have been written by authors from across the world, from undergraduates to professors, singly or in groups. Posts can be as simple as a call for information, or as extensive as a five and a half thousand word historical portrait (by Máté Varga, thenode.biologists.com/doctor-delayed-publications-remarkable-life-george-streisinger/careers). We have also run regular series of posts: ‘Forgotten Classics’, on unjustly neglected papers in developmental biology; ‘A day in the life of an X lab’, showcasing the diversity of developmental model organisms (Xenopus inaugurated the series; onychophorans are the most recent addition); ‘The people behind the papers’, our interview series that puts faces to the names on the author list (and that, in 2018, migrated to print in Development); and an alternative careers series, on all the other things scientists can do with their PhDs. Our jobs board (1172 jobs posted so far) is consistently well-read, and we often hear from people who got their ideal job, or their ideal student or postdoc, thanks to it. Our events calendar (1654 events posted so far) provides a promotional platform for organisers of meetings big and small. Finally, in 2015 we added a dedicated resources page, which contains useful links covering advocacy and outreach, education, audiovisuals and research methods. The page was greatly improved in 2017 thanks to an intern, Sarah Morson, who worked with the British Society for Developmental Biology's Communication Officer, Andreas Prokop.Although Community Managers have changed – Eva was followed by Catarina Vicente in 2013, and Catarina by Aidan Maartens in 2016 – the role continues to be vital, as we have discussed previously (Vicente et al., 2017). As well as maintaining the site and commissioning new content, the Community Manager can act as a new blogger's first reader or editor – we know it can be daunting to put writing online. Our experience of running the Node has also helped guide the design and implementation of The Company of Biologists' two newer community sites, preLights (preprint highlighting by early career researchers, prelights.biologists.com) and FocalPlane (Journal of Cell Science's site devoted to imaging, focalplane.biologists.com). Like the Node, these sites embody The Company of Biologists' motto of ‘supporting biologists, inspiring biology’.Another way the Node serves the developmental biology community is via social media: our Twitter account (twitter.com/the_Node) is fast approaching 15,000 followers and has become a hub for developmental biology in a much more dynamic and responsive way than the blog format provides. We hope the feed serves as a resource in itself – follow us and you'll find the latest research, discussions, beautiful images and movies, historical perspectives and job offers, and the odd groan-inducing pun.More recently, in January 2020 we launched the Node Network (thenode.biologists.com/network/), a global database of developmental and stem cell biologists. The Network aims to make it easier for you to find people for professional purposes (reviewers, panellists or speakers, for example), and importantly can also be used with diversity in mind (members can voluntarily add information about gender, ethnicity and disability status). We strongly believe in the benefits of diversity and inclusion in science (Briscoe and Brown, 2020), and hope that the Network will help diversify conferences, reviewer pools and panels. The Network currently has 717 members from 40 countries, with new PIs being the most represented career stage. Please consider using the Network if you are struggling to find the right scientist, and do consider becoming a member if you want to increase your visibility.Ten years in, and the numbers are good. The Node has been viewed over two million times, and we now regularly receive more than 30,000 page views per month. We are helped by a continual stream of new content: a blog post, job or event is typically uploaded every day. But as well as reflecting on the journey so far, we want to use this anniversary to think about where we're going, and how we can continue to serve and stay relevant to the community in a changing scientific and communication environment. In April we conducted a community survey (11 years after the one that spurred the Node into being), and noises were generally positive from the respondents – most of our features were considered useful, and most of our content enjoyable to read. We also asked what kind of things readers would like to see more of and were given some great ideas to work on, like more interactive content (‘ask me anything’ posts or webinars), ‘how to’ and technical posts, historical features and pieces on the scientific career ecosystem. We are currently developing these ideas and, as ever, will need authors: if you are interested in trying out scientific writing in an informal context about any of the above (or indeed anything relevant to the community), just get in touch or register for an account.Ten years ago, the Node was an experiment, and it really was not clear whether it would still be around a decade later. Today, the Node is a vibrant hub for researchers worldwide, with an ever-increasing readership and a host of new ideas for the future. Who knows where we'll be in 2030?
Eric Wieschaus is a HHMI Investigator, and the Squibb Professor in Molecular Biology at Princeton University and the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics. In 1995, he was awarded the Nobel Prize jointly with Edward Lewis and Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard for discoveries about the genetic control of Drosophila embryogenesis. We caught up with Eric at the joint meeting of the German and Japanese Societies of Developmental Biologists held in Kiel in March 2017, and discussed his career, his thoughts on the field and the impact the Nobel award had on his life.
Developmental biology is a discipline with a long and rich history, a vibrant and diverse present, and a future of tremendous potential. The field has had enormous impact beyond its own boundaries, for example providing many key concepts for medical research and laying the foundations for advances in the stem-cell and tissue-engineering fields. Technological advances are bringing new solutions to problems that have preoccupied the field for decades, including the potential to analyse our own (human) development. We stand poised on the brink of a deeper understanding not only of development, but increasingly also of regeneration and ageing.However, while we and others (St Johnston, 2015; Gilbert, 2017) would argue that the field is in a strong position, there is also reason for concern. At conference poster sessions and coffee breaks, departmental happy hours and water coolers, conversations inevitably turn to questions of funding and the future – the next grant, the next position, the next budget. Young researchers look to an uncertain future, and reasonably consider their place in it. Some countries are hit harder than others, and some researchers are more worried than others, notably those conducting basic research without an immediate translational impact. Of course, developmental biologists are not unique in feeling these concerns, but this does not lessen the stark contrast between the promise of the discipline and the threats felt against it. It is therefore vital to consider what individuals and organisations can do to advocate for the continuing importance of developmental biology. This editorial discusses some of our efforts in this regard, and announces a new article series that we hope will provide a useful advocacy resource for the field.Over the years, A.P. [Communications Officer of the British Society for Developmental Biology (BSDB, www.bsdb.org/)] has engaged in numerous long-term outreach and advocacy initiatives, and highlighted the importance of developmental biology (www.openaccessgovernment.org/developmental-biology-important/41386/). He argues that we should be ready to stand up for our field whenever there is an opportunity to engage with audiences, including the wider public, students, clinicians, journalists, funding agencies and policy makers. We need effective ways to do this, and our engagement will become more powerful if we collaborate and share our strategies and resources (see Illingworth and Prokop, 2017 and references therein). One concrete suggestion from A.P. is to prepare elevator pitches that convincingly explain the importance of your research; thenode.biologists.com/advocacy/outreach/ provides a concise rationale and selection of ideas for such pitches, as well as numerous references for individuals to further strengthen their case. So, reader, do you know your elevator pitch, and are you ready to engage?The BSDB's advocacy initiative is just one example of how organisations can help advocate developmental biology. The Society for Developmental Biology in the USA (www.sdbonline.org/) has undertaken numerous education and outreach activities, and with the BSDB and other societies is part of the global umbrella organisation the International Society for Developmental Biology (www.developmental-biology.org/). In the field of stem cell biology, the International Society for Stem Cell Research (www.isscr.org/about-isscr) provides a platform for advocacy, education about the latest stem cell advances. As well as facilitating science communication activities, such professional societies, along with funding bodies and academic institutions, can also do the essential (but perhaps less well documented) work of actively liaising with policy makers to achieve the necessary recognition of the importance of our discipline.But what can journals do? Development has long prided itself as a community journal, and seeks to help researchers in many ways aside from publications, for instance through our travelling fellowships and meeting grants supported by our not-for-profit publisher The Company of Biologists. Through social media, we promote inspiring new research to specialists and non-specialists alike. We also host a community blog, the Node (thenode.biologists.com), which serves as a space for developmental biologists to share information and ideas, and could, in principle, provide a platform for individuals and societies to cooperate and coordinate their advocacy efforts. To help facilitate this, Sarah Morson (who joined us in 2017 for a three-month internship) updated the Node's Resources page (available at thenode.biologists.com/resources). This resource incorporates the collections of links previously managed by A.P. on the BSDB website, covering the areas of advocacy, outreach and education, as well as sections dedicated to audio-visual and research tools. We hope these pages will be a dynamically evolving resource and encourage suggestions from the community for useful additions.With its wide readership, Development can act as a mouthpiece to advocate our discipline; that we should get more involved in such efforts was a strong theme running through the feedback we received during our recent community consultation. Following discussions among ourselves and with the journal's editorial group, we are now pleased to announce a series of articles that aim to advocate the wider importance of developmental biology.The first set of articles will set out to answer the question 'What has developmental biology ever done for us?' with a series of case studies linking particular discoveries in developmental biology to their wider scientific and societal impact. Most obviously, this will involve examples of how basic knowledge gleaned from model organisms has led to medical applications, but we also want to emphasise how the field has advanced our general understanding of how life works, contributing to knowledge and education as social values in their own right (Rull, 2014). With this set of articles, we aim not only to celebrate the prestigious history of our field, but also to provide concrete examples showing why we need to continue to do basic developmental biology research.To complement this historical angle, the second set of articles will look forward and ask 'What are the big open questions in the field?' We want to explore the fundamental unanswered questions in developmental biology and propose how we might start addressing them. The aim is not to wallow in the mystery of these questions, but rather to argue that, particularly with the breakneck speed of development of new tools, they are increasingly tangible. As well as providing signposts for the field's future, we hope that these articles will convince prospective students that there has never been a more exciting time to get involved in developmental biology – and, perhaps, provide inspiration in choosing their particular field of research.By providing a rationale for why we do developmental biology and where it is taking us, we hope that these articles will help to advocate our discipline, providing a useful resource for developmental biology educators and advocates, and also helping current researchers to develop their elevator pitches. Our first articles appear in this issue: Katrin Wiese, Roel Nusse and Renée van Amerongen survey the history of the Wnt pathway through multiple model organisms to its influence on the cancer and stem cell fields (Wiese et al., 2018), while Miki Ebisuya and James Briscoe provide a perspective on the meaning of time development (Ebisuya and Briscoe, 2018). We hope you will enjoy this collection of articles, and we welcome suggestions for further commissions.Developmental biology is a vital, fascinating and evolving discipline. As a global community, we can help to safeguard and support our field going forwards, and we encourage you all – through outreach and communication activities, discussions with funders and policy-makers – to get involved.
Bénédicte Sanson is a Reader in Developmental Morphogenesis and Wellcome Trust Investigator at the Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge. Her lab works on axis extension and compartmental boundary formation in the Drosophila embryo, combining genetics with quantitative and computational approaches. In 2019 she was awarded the British Society for Developmental Biology's Cheryll Tickle medal, which recognises outstanding achievements in developmental biology of mid-career female researchers. We caught up with Bénédicte in a café close to her lab and discussed how she started research not with flies but with phages and how collaboration and interdisciplinarity have always been at the core of her science.
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