Jean Léon Maître

Congratulations to the brilliant scientists shortlisted for the auditions @cnrs.fr for cell bio dev bio and evo-devo #section24!
Looking forward to hearing you in a few weeks.
Many other amazing candidates were no less deserving and we hope to see them next year.
sncs.fr/2025/12/11/c...

Cooperation between cortical and cytoplasmic forces shapes planar 4-cell stage embryos - preLights How to make a 4-cell square ascidian embryo? Cytoplasmic pulling rotates centrosomes, cortical forces lock the plane.

How to make a 4-cell square ascidian embryo? Cytoplasmic pulling rotates centrosomes, cortical forces lock the plane.

Corentin Mollier & Shivani Dharmadhikari highlight a #preprint from Silvia Caballero-Mancebo & team @rdumollard.bsky.social

#preLight ⬇️
prelights.biologists.com/highlights/c...

Just leaving from @manuelthery.bsky.social exhibition @museeorsay.bsky.social with stars of actin and microtubules in my head 🤩 😍

📣 #Job alert!
Looking to establish your own independent research in cell biology, development or evo-devo?
The @cnrs.fr is recruiting 7 scientists in that area of research.
Here are updated unofficial guidelines. Reach out to members of the committee if you have questions
c3n-cn.fr/section-24-w...

🤩 Tickets booked!!!

Want to join a happy bunch 🥳 to organise meetings, outreach activities and other initiatives about developmental biology in France? Apply and/or vote 🗳️!

Don't miss out on these opportunities to join this fantastic lab!

Simply stunning 🤩

On met les enfants en cage et on les électrocute pour la #FeteDeLaScience au @grandpalaisrmn.bsky.social par le @palaisdecouverte.bsky.social.

Jochen was a brilliant and visionary scientist who inspired me and so many others. His creativity blew my mind more than once and his generous advice early on in my career was extremely useful. How lucky I feel to have met him.

Former French president Sarkozy guilty of criminal conspiracy in Libyan campaign financing trial – Europe live Nicolas Sarkozy has been found guilty of conspiracy, but innocent of other charges, in case surrounding millions of euros in illegal campaign funding from late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi

Slowly and tediously, even the rich and powerful can be taken down in functional democracies. This is the third conviction for Sarkozy (and his acolytes). This should encourage other democracies in difficult situations to keep hoping for justice to prevail.
www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...

Trump Says the U.S. Will Institute $100,000 Fee for Skilled Worker Visas

I was on a H1B visa for part of my postdoc. Also when I started as Assistant Professor. Several of my postdocs where on H1Bs. This new fee will affect more academia than tech or finance companies because there is no way universities can pay that…

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/19/u...

We’re organizing a conference at @ijmonod.bsky.social in Paris, January 2026, in memory of M.P. Sheetz — pioneer in cell mechanics and mechanobiology, co-discoverer of kinesin, and founder of @mbisg.bsky.social. Join us to explore his legacy.

mikeinmemoriam.sciencesconf.org

Which city is the best for Cytoskeleton research?
Dresden? Barcelona? Cambridge ? Noooo ... you all know its Paris, right? 😎
Registering to the annual meeting on Friday 14th of November is now open:
pcd2025.sciencesconf.org
Keynote speeches by @carter-lab.bsky.social and Verena Ruprecht !

Bravo Juliane!
You can enjoy the middle and the end as well 😄

Patterned invagination prevents mechanical instability during gastrulation - Nature In Drosophila, the cephalic furrow counteracts mechanical stress as the developing head and the trunk tissues meet, providing evidence for how mechanical forces influence the evolution of morphog...

We had #four interdisciplinary teams, integrating dev-bio, evolution, tissue mechanics, and biophysical modeling, all going full throttle to understand the #CF. Still, it took more than 7 years to publish two papers back-to-back (10/12)

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

We are all super happy and proud to see our work on the function and evolution of the #cephalic #furrow published in @nature.com. Let me say a few things about the background and history of this work on the #Evolution_of_Morphogenesis (1/12)

How is this possible?

This ant can lay eggs of two different species, birthed by the same mother

Expansion microscopy micrograph of the choanoflagellate Choanoeca flexa, vaguely evocative of a cactus. Red = tubulin, green = actin, blue = DNA

Same with yellow = lipids (BODIPY)

A dream come true: the first expansion microscopy images of C. flexa 🤩 Generated by Mylan & Uzuki who learned from the best (@hiralshah.bsky.social @gautamdey.bsky.social @dudinlab.bsky.social). We will learn so much from these!

🔬 The next international Developmental Biology course, organized by Institut Curie with @sorbonne-universite.fr, will focus on "From stem #cells to #morphogenesis".

📅 Apply by:
• July 20 (3.5 weeks with hands-on workshop)
• Aug 31 (10 days of seminars)

🔗 training.institut-curie.org/courses/deve...

Human Development: Stem Cells, Models, Embryos. 7 - 9 September 2026 University of Warwick, UK. Resgiter your interest. #HumanDev26. Image credit: Susanna Narkilahti, Tampere University, Finland

Save the Date!

Development has teamed up with the Wellcome-funded consortium the Human Developmental Biology Initiative to co-organise a meeting on #HumanDevelopment.

📅7 - 9 Sep 2026
📍University of Warwick, UK

Register your interest for #HumanDev26: www.biologists.com/meetings/dev...

SARCOMERES divide! Mechanism how muscles grow while contracting - daughter sarcomeres appear everywhere. Seen live, registered on our cover. Pioneered by @clementrodier.bsky.social @friedrich-group.bsky.social Ian Estabrook @ibdm.bsky.social $ by @hfspo.bsky.social www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Congratulations Ina! @hubrechtinstitute.bsky.social is lucky to have you!

Congratulations Monica (and CRG)!

Happy to be the next (and 1st female) @crg.eu director. The CRG always stood out to me, for its excellence in understanding life's principles, with implications for health and biodiversity, & its collaborative, open and innovative way of doing science. Thrilled to join its amazing community in 2026!

Had a very productive day @eshre.bsky.social #eshre2025 meeting with the biomedical community! We have a very different way of thinking and questioning the embryo and a lot to learn from each other!

Happy to be elected at the national committee @cnrs.fr
I thank all of those who voted🙏.
I promise to do my best to promote excellence in science through diversity and interdisciplinarity, transparency and discussion with the public.
📣Let me know what you would like to see improved @cnrs.fr📣

On the Shape of Life: meeting report, SFBD meeting 2025 - the Node Recently, I attended ‘Shaping Life 3’, the quadrennial meeting of the French Society of Developmental Biology (SFBD). The first of these meetings happened

On the Shape of Life: meeting report, SFBD meeting 2025

Girish Kale @girishkalephd.bsky.social wrote about his experience attending #ShapingLife3, the @sfbd.bsky.social meeting, which took place in the picturesque town of Cassis:

thenode.biologists.com/on-the-shape...

@dudinlab.bsky.social @julianeg.bsky.social @keillab.bsky.social @deniskrndija.bsky.social @laghalab.bsky.social @francoisleulier.bsky.social @levayerr.bsky.social @cellysally.bsky.social @alexmcdougall.bsky.social @mariemonniaux.bsky.social @nicolettapetridou.bsky.social @bertaverd.bsky.social

📣Join us for the DEVELOPMENTAL BIOLOGY COURSE @institutcurie.bsky.social @sorbonne-universite.fr
We have fantastic speakers and registration is free!
training.institut-curie.org/courses/deve...
@karinayaniv.bsky.social @doetschlab.bsky.social @eileen-furlong.bsky.social @jesseveenvliet.bsky.social