rorylcooper.bsky.social - Profile | ThreadSky | a Reddit-style client for Bluesky

Head scales of the Sulcata tortoise, imaged with light sheet microscopy. Our new study in @cp-iscience.bsky.social reveals that their emergence is controlled by both chemical cues and mechanical forces. Read the full article here 🐢🔬🧪 www.cell.com/iscience/ful...

submitted 2 days ago • 1 comment

This is the skull of a tortoise embryo imaged with light sheet microscopy. Check out our new article in @cp-iscience.bsky.social to learn how both chemical signalling and mechanical forces sculpt their intricate head scales 🐢🔬🧪 www.cell.com/iscience/ful...

submitted 7 days ago • 0 comments

Excited to share our new research in @cp-iscience.bsky.social! We reveal that tortoise head scales are sculpted through two distinct developmental processes - chemical signalling and mechanical folding 🐢🔬🧪 @lanevol.bsky.social @genevunige.bsky.social www.cell.com/iscience/ful...

submitted 8 days ago • 3 comments

It's finally here! Great start of the summer. We got our latest preprint from @chemamd.bsky.social in @qmulsbbs.bsky.social @qmulse.bsky.social, showing evidence of developmental system drift in the specification of dorsoventral (belly vs back) axis in annelids 🪱🪱🪱 #DevBio #EvoDevo

submitted 10 days ago • 1 comment

‼️10 days left to register and submit your abstract!! Come and join us to help relaunch the UK EvoDevo meetings. An exciting day with friends and good science! Register and submit your abstract here 👉🏻 eshop.qmul.ac.uk/conferences-...

submitted 22 days ago • 1 comment

New paper from the lab: Our teeth arose as sensory organs on the outside of the body of ancient jawless fish.!! Congrats to Yara Haridy and the team! Background and video: phys.org/news/2025-05... Open Access Paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41... News and Views: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

submitted 22 days ago • 15 comments

Exacerbated sonic hedgehog signalling promotes a transition from chemical pre-patterning of chicken reticulate scales to mechanical skin folding: royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/... @lanevol.bsky.social‬ @rorylcooper.bsky.social‬ #OpenBiology #DevBio #biophysics

submitted 45 days ago • 1 comment

Have you noticed the rotating header images on our site? They're winners of a competition we ran in 2021. Thank you @gaparicio.bsky.social @rorylcooper.bsky.social @zebrafish007.bsky.social @ebardot.bsky.social & Markus Schliffka for the images! Give us a visit: thenode.biologists.com

submitted 46 days ago • 0 comments

ICYMI, our new work in @royalsocietypublishing.org's Open Biology shows how mechanical forces can drive patterning. By altering growth & material properties of the chicken embryo's skin in vivo, we induce a shift from molecular to mechanical patterning 🐣 🧪 royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

submitted 49 days ago • 0 comments

🚨 We make the cover of Open Biology! Boosting sonic hedgehog signalling in chicken embryos flips the script of skin patterning—chemical pre-patterns give way to mechanical folding. 🧬 From Turing to tissue mechanics. 🧪 ➡️ royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/... #shh #DevBio @royalsociety.org

submitted 51 days ago • 0 comments

We are recruiting new PhD students! Are you interested in tissue mechanics and how size in animals is controlled? Then join us for an exciting PhD at the interface of developmental biology, biophysics and computational modelling. Check our webpage for more detail: lsi.exeter.ac.uk/groups/harma...

submitted 57 days ago • 0 comments

This is the leg of a hatchling chicken, showing their precisely arranged scales 🐣. Read our new article in @royalsocietypublishing.org's Open Biology to learn how they develop, and how we can mechanically transform them into a pattern of brain-like folds! 🧪 royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

submitted 57 days ago • 1 comment

Check out our new research in @royalsocietypublishing.org's Open Biology! We experimentally induce a transition from chemical to mechanical patterning in the chicken embryo 🐣🔬 @lanevol.bsky.social 🧪 royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

submitted 57 days ago • 1 comment

The March 2025 issue of @plosbiology.org is live, and the cover is finger-lickin' good! Many thanks to @rorylcooper.bsky.social & @lanevol.bsky.social for this stunning cover image of a developing chick embryo wing. journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

submitted 59 days ago • 0 comments

Great to see our chicken wing image featured on the cover of @plosbiology.org 🐣🔬! To learn more about how these feathers develop, check out the full article here ⬇️🧪 journals.plos.org/plosbiology/... @lanevol.bsky.social @genevunige.bsky.social

submitted 59 days ago • 1 comment

This microCT image shows shark skin denticles— small tooth-like scales capable of reducing drag and improving hydrodynamics 🔬🦈 🧪

submitted 62 days ago • 1 comment

This is the head of a chicken embryo after 16 days of development, imaged with light sheet microscopy 🐣🔬🧪

submitted 63 days ago • 5 comments

Thrilled that our image was selected for the cover of @royalsocietypublishing.org's Open Biology! We experimentally induced a developmental shift from normal footpad scales to mechanically-driven folding on chicken embryo digits 🐣🔬. Stay tuned—the full article is coming soon! 🧪 #DevBio

submitted 64 days ago • 0 comments

The Node-FocalPlane image competition at #biologists100. All the votes are now in, and we can announce our three prize winners: @oozguc.bsky.social, @allancarbal.bsky.social and @jupeloggia.bsky.social. Read more ⤵️: focalplane.biologists.com/2025/03/27/a...

submitted 77 days ago • 2 comments

We have had more photos taken with our polaroid frame at #biologists100! We caught up with Kavitha Chinnaiya @kchinnaiya.bsky.social (@sheffielduni.bsky.social) during the poster session #hypothalamus #ChickEmbryo #homeostasis #BMP #FGF10 #Shh

submitted 78 days ago • 0 comments

🚨Registration for the UK #EvoDevo meeting is open! Join us on July 11th in London to enjoy an exciting day of talks, posters, friends, and superb science! -Registration (only £5!): shorturl.at/9cQGL -More info: londonevodevo.ac.uk

submitted 79 days ago • 5 comments

Come check out poster 185 in tonight's session at #biologists100 🐣! And for more detail, here's the full article recently published in @plosbiology.org journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

submitted 79 days ago • 2 comments

On the train to #biologists100! Come check out poster 185 and talk to me about organs that grow from the skin 🐣 🐊

submitted 80 days ago • 0 comments

The Shh pathway is a key regulator of feather development. @rorylcooper.bsky.social & @lanevol.bsky.social show that inhibiting Shh during chick embryogenesis results in unbranched #feather buds, similar to those seen in some of their #dinosaur ancestors 🧪 @plosbiology.org plos.io/4bIYQCx

submitted 83 days ago • 0 comments

The Shh pathway is a key regulator of feather development. @rorylcooper.bsky.social & @lanevol.bsky.social show that inhibiting Shh during chick embryogenesis results in unbranched #feather buds, similar to those seen in some of their #dinosaur ancestors 🧪 @plosbiology.org plos.io/4bIYQCx

submitted 83 days ago • 0 comments

Check out these feather buds on the chicken embryo's wing! Our latest study @plosbiology.org reveals that temporary inhibition of sonic hedgehog signalling transforms feathers into simple, protofeather-like structures—similar to those of their dinosaur ancestors🔬🦖🧪 journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

submitted 83 days ago • 6 comments

The Shh pathway is a key regulator of feather development. @rorylcooper.bsky.social & @lanevol.bsky.social show that inhibiting Shh during chick embryogenesis results in unbranched #feather buds, similar to those seen in some of their #dinosaur ancestors 🧪 @plosbiology.org plos.io/4bIYQCx

submitted 83 days ago • 1 comment

Inhibiting feather development in chickens temporarily results in structures similar to ancestral protofeathers: journals.plos.org/plosbiology/... 🪶🧪 (📷 @rorylcooper.bsky.social & @lanevol.bsky.social)

submitted 84 days ago • 3 comments

🚨🐣 Our new paper is out @plosbiology.org! Sonic hedgehog inhibition transforms feathers into ancestral protofeathers-like structures. These units then recover after hatching, highlighting their remarkable developmental robustness! @lanevol.bsky.social 🧪 journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

submitted 84 days ago • 3 comments

🚨 Paper Alert 🚨 Absolutely delighted to share our last paper on "spatial mechano-transcriptomics" @naturemethods👇!! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

submitted 87 days ago • 11 comments

#DBfeature 🦈🦷 Evolution, development, and regeneration of tooth-like epithelial appendages in sharks by Ella Nicklin, Gareth Fraser et al @ellanicklin.bsky.social @garethjfraser.bsky.social www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

submitted 87 days ago • 0 comments

Sharks and rays have the oldest vertebrate sex chromosome with unique sex determination mechanisms https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.03.13.642935v1

submitted 90 days ago • 1 comment

Happy to share our review on methodology for measuring and manipulating mechanical forces with specific focus on developmental biology! Congrats to authors @clemvilleneuve.bsky.social @mccreery.bsky.social and hats off to the community for developing awesome tools www.nature.com/articles/s41...

submitted 94 days ago • 1 comment

Have you noticed the rotating header images on our site? They're winners of a competition we ran in 2021. Thank you @gaparicio.bsky.social @rorylcooper.bsky.social @zebrafish007.bsky.social @ebardot.bsky.social & Markus Schliffka for the images! Give us a visit: thenode.biologists.com

submitted 95 days ago • 0 comments

I am grateful to @cancerresearchuk.org for choosing to support our work aiming to understand the links between distorted embryonic development and neuroblastoma initiation using our human pluripotent stem cell differentiation model: www.sheffield.ac.uk/biosciences/...

submitted 98 days ago • 6 comments

A warm welcome to DRN Research Fellow Rory Cooper @rorylcooper.bsky.social Rory is an evolutionary developmental biologist investigating biological pattern formation of skin appendages in diverse vertebrate models, including sharks, chickens, and crocodiles. www.sheffield.ac.uk/biosciences/...

submitted 98 days ago • 0 comments

Matt Towers & Alex Fletcher are advertising a fully funded PhD project to investigate feather development in @drn-sheffield.bsky.social at @sheffielduni.bsky.social 🐥🦈🔬 Come join us - it'll be a super cool project! Send me a message if you have any questions 🧪 www.findaphd.com/phds/project...

submitted 99 days ago • 0 comments

The Northern England Developmental Biology @bsdb.bsky.social @biologists.bsky.social meeting takes place on July 10th in Sheffield. Register by May 31st - its gonna be cool 😎 (see the poster below for details)!

submitted 105 days ago • 0 comments

New preprint alert. Ever wondered why frogs only have upper jaw teeth? @danpaluh.bsky.social investigates this conundrum and asks if frogs ever form lower jaw tooth rudiments and what the relationship is between tadpole keratodonts (keratin mouthparts) and teeth! 🐸🦷🔥 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

submitted 113 days ago • 2 comments

In case you missed it, here's an article we wrote for @the-node.bsky.social to describe how crocodile head scales arise from compressive folding 🐊 🔬 🧪 thenode.biologists.com/the-mechanic... And here's the original research article ⬇️ www.nature.com/articles/s41... @genevunige.bsky.social

submitted 115 days ago • 0 comments

Developmental Biology going strong at the Crick Beddington Symposium #BeddingtonConf @crick.ac.uk terrific first session talks by @giuliapaci.bsky.social @sarawickstrom.bsky.social @maitrejl.bsky.social @bertaverd.bsky.social covering topics from nuclear mechanics to crocodile head patterns!

submitted 122 days ago • 0 comments

Check out this baby crocodile emerging from its egg 🥚 🐊 And read our recent article in @nature.com to learn how compressive forces sculpt their intricate head scales 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/s41... @lanevol.bsky.social @genevunige.bsky.social

submitted 125 days ago • 0 comments

🎉 We're excited to share our new research in @nature.com ! We reveal that crocodile head scales self-organize through compressive folding of the skin - a mechanical twist on their development & evolution! Please read & share 🐊🔬 @genevunige.bsky.social

submitted 155 days ago • 1 comment