Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Amir Porat

Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University (SLCU) @slcuplants.bsky.social · 21d

🌿💻 Plant Models and Morphology 💻🌿

The 9th International Plant Computational Biology Workshop @slcuplants.bsky.social brought together mathematicians, computer scientists, physicists and biologists exploring plant development through models and simulations.

Huge thanks to organisers and speakers!👏

Group photo of workshop attendees standing in ginkgo tree courtyard with the Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University building in background.

1 4 18

Reposted by Amir Porat

Gabriella Mosca @moscabiomeclab.bsky.social · Sep 7

The BM^2 Lab is hiring a Ph.D. student to work on a variety of problems connected to modeling of morphogenesis in plants (i.e. ovule curvature formation, fixed handedness establishment in certain plant organs and its link to cell wall mechanics).

Please share!

1 38 34

Reposted by Amir Porat

Botanical Society of America @botsocamerica.bsky.social · Apr 4

The self-replicating cellular organization of shoot apical #meristems

New #AJB research by Étienne Couturier, @paulallanos.bsky.social, Antoine Lizée, Sébastien Besson & Jacques Dumais

bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/... #botany #plantscience #bryophytes #lycophytes #ferns

A circular diagram resembling a moth atop five colorful geometrical figures.

1 5 14

Reposted by Amir Porat

Journal of Experimental Botany @jxbotany.bsky.social · Aug 29

🔎 DARWIN REVIEW 🔎

Mody et al. review the study of the cellular basis of plant morphogenesis with 3D digital organs 🔬🌱

🔗 doi.org/10.1093/jxb/...

#PlantScience 🧪 @kschneitz.bsky.social

Fig. 1 (shortened, full legend in paper): Pipeline to generate 3D digital organs demonstrated using a stage 3-V Cardamine hirsuta ovule. (A) The generation of a 3D digital organ starts with 3D imaging of the organ of interest stained with a cell wall stain such as SR2200. The 3D rendering of a confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) z-stack of ovule with SR2200-stained cell walls is shown. The bounding box shows the xyz imaging directions of the ovule in the 3D view (top panel).

7 26

Amir Porat @amirporat.bsky.social · Aug 29

New preprint!
"Understanding Shape and Residual Stress Dynamics in Rod-Like Plant Organs" 🌱
with @merozlab.bsky.social and @routierlab.bsky.social
👉 doi.org/10.1101/2025...

bioRxivpreprint @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social · Aug 29

Understanding Shape and Residual Stress Dynamics in Rod-Like Plant Organs https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.08.25.672092v1

1 6 14

Reposted by Amir Porat

Zoe Nemec Venza @zoenv.bsky.social · Aug 27

Here it is! Epidermal cells in the root can figure out if they are covered by the root cap or not using mechanical signals! Thanks to @ckirchhelle.bsky.social, @moritznowack.bsky.social, @nathan-german.bsky.social Annamaria Kiss and all the others!

bioRxiv Plant Bio @biorxiv-plants.bsky.social · Aug 27

Plant cells at the organ surface use mechanical cues to activate a specific growth control programme https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.08.25.672229v1

2 13 32

Reposted by Amir Porat

arXiv cond-mat.soft Soft Condensed Matter @condmatsoft-bot.bsky.social · Aug 27

Kelly Aspinwall, Tyler Hain, M. Lisa Manning: Rigidity and mechanical response in biological structures https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.18432 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2508.18432 https://arxiv.org/html/2508.18432

5 7

Reposted by Amir Porat

Camila Goldy🌱🔬🧉 @camilagoldy.bsky.social · Aug 24

Take a look at part of my work with @mc-caillaud.bsky.social at @rdplab.bsky.social about the role of actin cytoskeleton to maintain cytokinesis against cellular geometry 🌱🔬

bioRxiv Plant Bio @biorxiv-plants.bsky.social · Aug 23

Actin Counters Geometry to Guide Plant Cell Division https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.08.18.670899v1

14 21

Reposted by Amir Porat

Giulia Paci @giuliapaci.bsky.social · Aug 11

Thrilled to share the first story from my postdoc! 🎉 A wonderful experiment + simulations collaboration. In the Drosophila wing, we find that 3D cell shapes affect signalling range and fine-tune developmental patterning www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... Thread below ⬇️

5 40 100

Reposted by Amir Porat

Arif Ashraf @aribidopsis.bsky.social · Aug 9

🍀🔬

CSLD5-mediated cell wall remodelling regulates tissue mechanics and shoot meristem growth @natcomms.nature.com

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Movies: Cell division orientation in wild-type (attached) and csld5 (comment) shoot apical meristem.

1 9 24

Reposted by Amir Porat

Soeren Strauss @soestrauss.bsky.social · Aug 5

Submitted and out as preprint: A Plausible Model of Phyllotaxis Patterning from a Single Apical Cell. 🪴🌱 Including 3D cell analysis & modeling #MorphoGraphX #MorphoDynamX #Physcomitrella #Phyllotaxis @roederlab.bsky.social @richardsmithlab.bsky.social dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn...

2 11

Reposted by Amir Porat

Ricard Alert Zenón @ricardalert.bsky.social · Aug 2

Dreaming of a swimming pool? Bacteria are surrounded by water! Water capillary forces organize bacterial colonies into gas, nematic streams, or droplet states. New paper @natphys.nature.com led by Matt Black and Chenyi Fei, with Ned Wingreen and Josh Shaevitz!

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Capillary interactions drive the self-organization of bacterial colonies - Nature Physics

Bacteria tend to live in thin layers of water on surfaces. Now the capillary forces in these layers are shown to help organize the bacteria into dense packs.

www.nature.com

3 13 56

Reposted by Amir Porat

Luis Alonso Baez @luisalonsobaez.bsky.social · Aug 1

One of the key aspects influencing morphogenesis is mechanics. We mapped the mechanical properties of living roots at the tissue and cellular levels using Brillouin microscopy and molecular rotors.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

17 41

Reposted by Amir Porat

Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University (SLCU) @slcuplants.bsky.social · Jul 30

📢 Final hours to register for the Plant Computational Biology Workshop 2025! 📢
Don’t miss your chance to take part in talks and hands-on sessions with other plant modelling enthusiasts🪴
Deadline tomorrow (31 July) - www.slcu.cam.ac.uk/computationa...
#ComputationalBiology #PlantSci

11 17

Reposted by Amir Porat

Kalika Prasad @kalikaprasad.bsky.social · Jul 25

Our new paper is out!
1/14 How does an organ rebuild its shape after injury? It's not just about making new cells, but aligning them in the right direction — like bricks shaping a structure. We show that it's all driven by Cell Geometry!

www.cell.com/current-biol...

Wound repair in plants guided by cell geometry

Mathew et al. show that growth conflicts reshape cells after injury, forming rhomboidal geometries that trigger diagonal divisions. This reorients cell files to restore tapered morphology. A two-step ...

www.cell.com

3 22 52

Reposted by Amir Porat

Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University (SLCU) @slcuplants.bsky.social · Jul 23

🚨Don’t miss out! Last weeks left to register for the Plant Computational Biology Workshop 2025, sponsored by @cambup-lifesci.cambridge.org 🌱
📆Deadline 31 July - www.slcu.cam.ac.uk/computationa...
#ComputationalBiology #PlantSci

1 8 18

Reposted by Amir Porat

Argyris Zardilis @zardilis.bsky.social · Jul 23

Come and work with us!
We are hiring a research assistant/associate @slcuplants.bsky.social to work on the RESYDE project (www2.hu-berlin.de/resyde/)
using ML for multi-scale data and modelling to understand and engineer flower development!

Details: www.jobs.cam.ac.uk/job/52116/

Home -

RESYDE: Re-engineering symmetry breaking in development and evolution. A consortia of plant scientists from Europe and Australia has been awarded a prestigious research grant from the ERC, which will ...

www2.hu-berlin.de

5 7

Reposted by Amir Porat

James Briscoe @jamesbriscoe.bsky.social · Jul 23

New work with Saunders & Charras labs

Physical boundaries guide cell fate decisions during human trunk development

Reaction Diffusion model shows how geometry shapes biology with TBXT expression forming consistent domains regardless of colony size & shape

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Boundary constraints can determine pattern emergence

The robust patterning of cell fates during embryonic development requires precise coordination of signalling gradients within defined spatial constraints. Using a geometrically confined in vitro syste...

www.biorxiv.org

1 16 54

Reposted by Amir Porat

Anne-Lise Routier-Kierzkowska @routierlab.bsky.social · Jul 17

Our recent review on the origin of mechanical stresses in plants, in collaboration with Agata Burian:
doi.org/10.1016/j.pb...

2 6

Reposted by Amir Porat

epithelial mechanics fan club @epimechfc.bsky.social · Jul 11

Krishna, S., Gopinath, A., & Bhattacharjee, S. M. (2022). Ordering and topological defects in social wasps' nests. Scientific reports, 12(1), 12901. #EpithelialMechanics www.nature.com/articles/s41...

6 13

Amir Porat @amirporat.bsky.social · Jun 19

Highly recommended! 🪴

Anne-Lise Routier-Kierzkowska @routierlab.bsky.social · Jun 19

📢UdeM offers 6 #postdoc positions in natural sciences with competitive salaries! I'm looking for candidates interested in #biomechanics of growth, #mechanosensitivity, or #biomimetism. PhD in physics, bio, math, CS or engineering required. Contact me ASAP to apply!
fas.umontreal.ca/postdoctoral...

Postdoctoral training

The Faculty of Arts and Science of the Université de Montréal, thanks to a generous donation from the Courtois Foundation, is pleased to launch the Courtois Scientific Vanguard Fund of the Faculty of Arts and Science, aimed at research talents working outside of Canada.

fas.umontreal.ca

Reposted by Amir Porat

Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University (SLCU) @slcuplants.bsky.social · Jun 13

🚨 Calling all plant modelling enthusiasts!
Plant Computational Biology Workshop
Open to researchers at all levels
Workshop is free. Participants cover own travel, food & accommodation
📅 8-12 Sept | 💻 Talks, tools & hand-on sessions
🔗 www.slcu.cam.ac.uk/computationa...
#ComputationalBiology #PlantSci

Promotional poster with images of an Arabidopsis flower development over time from a cluster of identical cells to the final flower and two models of Arabirbiopsis flower meristems highligting active genes. Text reads: 9th Plant Computational Biology Workshop, 8-12 September 2025, Sainsbury Laboratory, University fo Cambridge.

25 24

Reposted by Amir Porat

Meroz Lab @merozlab.bsky.social · Jun 1

Mechanical interactions between plants and surroundings plays a huge role in understanding how plants negotiate their environment - but measuring low forces of free plants is hard!

In this preprint Amir Ohad presents a new sensor - using a drinking straw!

www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

2 9

Reposted by Amir Porat

New York Times Opinion @nytopinion.nytimes.com · May 23

The concern over antisemitism allegedly motivating the federal defunding of science at Harvard "is patently disingenuous, given Mr. Trump’s sympathy for Holocaust deniers and Hitler fans. The obvious motivation is to cripple civil society institutions,” writes the Harvard professor Steven Pinker.

Opinion | Harvard Derangement Syndrome

In my 22 years as a Harvard professor, I have not been afraid to bite the hand that feeds me. So I’m hardly an apologist when I say the invective aimed at Harvard has become unhinged.

www.nytimes.com

30 76 310

Reposted by Amir Porat

morphonet.bsky.social @morphonet.bsky.social · May 23

🙌We are thrilled to announce that our latest paper has been published in eLife : doi.org/10.7554/eLif...
💻Discover how MorphoNet can help you segment, curate, analyze and augment your 3D / 3D + t datasets without having to do a line of code, and much more ! 🦠

MorphoNet 2.0: An innovative approach for qualitative assessment and segmentation curation of large-scale 3D time-lapse imaging datasets

doi.org

1 1