Biology Open

@biologyopen

Facilitating rapid review for accessible research - an online only, #OpenAccess @biologists.bsky.social peer reviewed journal for research across all aspects of the biological sciences.

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Biology Open@biologyopen· 19d

Alexis V. Schmid and colleagues uncover a critical early signaling cascade during the inflammatory response to heart injury and provide new insights into the mechanisms that choreograph zebrafish heart regeneration. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Interferon signaling is not required for macrophage recruitment to the heart injury zone. (A) Representative images of RNA-FISH of mpeg (labels macrophages) and myl7 (labels cardiomyocytes), in wild-type and ifnphi1−/− ventricle cryosections at 3 dpi. Sections were counterstained with DAPI (blue). BA, bulbus arteriosus; A, atrium; V, uninjured ventricle; W, wound. Injury border is shown as a dashed line. (B) Percent macrophages were calculated by dividing the number of mpeg speckles by the number of nucleated cells in the injured and uninjured zones. The dots on the graph represent the uninjured or injured zones calculated from individual sections of distinct heart ventricles. Data are shown as the mean±s.d.; n=7 wild type and n=9 ifnphi1−/−. Scale bars: 50 μm.

Biology Open@biologyopen· 21d

To find out more about this research, read our interview with Capucine Januel, a veterinary student at École Nationale Vétérinaire de Toulouse in France. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Biology Open@biologyopen· 21d

Capucine Januel and colleagues demonstrate that it is feasible to translate ages across the lifespan of humans and cats. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Biology Open@biologyopen· 22d

With Fast & Fair peer review, we are rethinking peer review speed without lowering standards. Apply now to join our reviewer pool and get paid to review manuscripts. biologists.com/bio-fast-and...

Fast and Fair peer review, a new initiative offering high-quality peer review within 7 working days of submission

Biology Open@biologyopen· 23d

Xiangdong Wu and colleagues reveal a previously unrecognized mechanism whereby fructose induces thyroid hormone resistance, suppresses UCP-1 expression, and impairs brown adipocyte differentiation and thermogenic programming. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

$Morphology of immortalized brown preadipocyte and differentiated brown adipocyte during 12-day differentiation. The stromal vascular fraction (SVF) cells were isolated from the interscapular brown adipose tissue (iBAT) of 1-day-old mouse pups. Brown preadipocytes were immortalized by expression of the large T antigen. Cells were induced and differentiated in induction medium and differentiation medium for 12 days. Cell images were acquired using a Leica DMi8 microscope with visible-light, color-channel, and phase-contrast settings. Images were processed by Leica Application Suite X software. The magnification was 10×20.$

Biology Open@biologyopen· 25d

Jack E. Thirkwell and colleagues find that naked mole-rat resting metabolic rate is primarily determined by body mass, remains unusually low for mammals, and shows limited influence from sex, reproduction, or social rank. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Body mass and RMR (ml O2 h−1) in naked mole-rats (H. glaber). (A) RMR–body mass relationship across 76 individuals. The black dashed line shows the fitted relationship for naked mole-rats, while the red dashed line represents the predicted allometric scaling for mammals (Kleiber's law: RMR=3.40×Body mass0.75). (B) RMR–body mass relationships for five colonies. Lines indicate colony-specific model fits. (C) RMR–body mass relationship for non-breeding individuals across sex (♀: Female; ♂: Male). (D) Female RMR–body mass relationship separated by breeding status (breeders versus non-breeders).

Biology Open@biologyopen· 27d

Michi Miura and colleagues suggest that bacterial chaperone Trigger Factor opens up the structural analysis of HTLV-1 Tax by enabling the preparation of soluble and functional recombinant HTLV-1 Tax. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Activation of NF-κB by the recombinant Tax protein folded by Trigger Factor. (A) Western blot to detect phosphorylated IκB. The reaction mixtures, each containing Jurkat cell extract and the test protein (either WT or M22, as indicated), were analysed. The red arrowhead indicates the band of phosphorylated IκB, identified by its molecular size; the faint bands between 95 and 130 kDa are nonspecific. (B) Western blot to detect GAPDH (arrowhead) from the Jurkat cell extract in the reaction mixtures. (C) Western blot to detect the histidine-tagged recombinant proteins (arrowhead) in the reaction mixtures. (A-C) The blots are representative of two independent experiments using separate protein preparations.

Biology Open@biologyopen· 28d

Are you an early-career researcher based in the Global South? Apply by 20 November 2026 for BiO Global South Conference Travel Grants to attend an international biological or biomedical conference. More information at www.biologists.com/grants/bio-g...

BiO Global South Conference Travel Grants. Supporting ECRs in the Global South to attend international biological and biomedical science conferences. Application deadline: 20 November 2026.

Biology Open@biologyopen· 29d

This article was handled through our Fast & Fair peer review workflow. This initiative aims to provide authors with a first decision post review within 7 working days. Read more articles handled through our Fast & Fair peer review in our collection. bit.ly/4fiAxNE

Biology Open@biologyopen· 29d

Prateek K. Sahu, @cbsturdy.bsky.social and colleagues demonstrate the potential role of non-vocal cues in acoustic threat assessment in small passerines. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jul 11

Norma Martínez-Lendech and colleagues suggest that biparental care in H. bartoni involves distinct behavioral roles and physiological costs, with females bearing greater oxidative demands doi.org/10.1242/bio.... Drawing by María de Lourdes Pérez Fosado.

Artwork showing a solitary male at the top, without nuptial coloration, and a pair below displaying the typical nuptial coloration, white (top of the body) and black.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jul 10

Congratulations to all the winners of the BiO Global South Conference Travel Grants, who are attending the EZM conference in Vienna this week!

The winners of the BiO Global South Conference Travel Grants with Editor-in-Chief Dan Gorelick

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jul 9

Jiří Ulrich and colleagues develop an open-hardware hive system that standardises bee observation, has compatibility with existing beekeeping practice and enables consistent data processing across studies. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Visualisation of a honeybee queen (n=1) trajectory covering one hive side recorded for a full day on 10 July 2023. The background image is an illustrative stitched image from the experimental setup cameras. Trajectory points are coloured by the time of day at which the queen occupied each position, following the colour bar on the right [time (h)], which runs from 0 h (start of recording, dark purple) to 24 h (end of recording, yellow).

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jul 7

Rodrigo Gómez Alés and colleagues show that under climate-warming scenarios, reduced access to cooler microhabitats may accelerate sperm senescence and compromise reproductive success in high-mountain ectotherms. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jul 6

Our Editor Tristan Rodriguez @tristanrodriguez72.bsky.social will be at #ISSCR2026. If you're there too, feel free to say hello and ask him any questions you have about our Fast & Fair peer review initiative and about publishing in BiO.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jul 5

Darline Murat and colleagues reveal that a newly identified sperm protein, SPSP-1, is required for hermaphrodite fertility and embryonic viability. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

spsp-1 mutations result in decreased brood sizes. (A) Diagram of the spsp-1 gene. spsp-1 contains 1289 bp with five exons. spsp-1(syb2478Δ) is a 1125 bp deletion and spsp-1(syb2479Δ) is a 1324 bp deletion spanning into the 3′ UTR. (B-D). Average brood sizes of N2 and spsp-1Δ mutants at 20°C, 24°C, and 25°C. Sample sizes (number of individual hermaphrodite broods) at 20°C: N2 N=21, spsp-1(syb2478Δ) N=30, and spsp-1(syb2479Δ) N=24; 24°C N2 N=28, spsp-1(syb2478Δ) N=35, and spsp-1(syb2479Δ) N=30; 25°C N2 N=25 spsp-1(syb2478Δ) N=22, and spsp-1(syb2479Δ) N=26. Bars represent mean±s.d. Statistics were performed using a Welch's t-test. ns, not significant, ****P<0.0001.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jul 3

Naghmana Ashraf and colleagues reveal that CO2 tension is a key metabolic signal influencing cellular #StressResponses and highlight how experimental conditions can shape biological outcomes. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

CO2 modulates autophagy. CO2 levels modulates TFE3, AMPK and mTORC1/2 signaling to regulate lysosome abundance, autophagosome-lysosome fusion, and proteolytic function, which collectively impact the rate of autophagy.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jul 1

Shifting paradigms: phosphatases from basic biology to druggable targets Catia Pierotti & co summarise the key findings and novel insights presented at the #EMBO Workshop ‘Phosphatases: from basic research to translation’ and reflect the progress being made in the field. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Participants at the EMBO Phosphatase Workshop during lunch at the Juliusspital Conference Centre in Würzburg, Germany.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 25

Anticipating the impact of cryosphere loss - including snow, glaciers, sea ice & permafrost - on unique parts of #biodiversity. Kinga Skoczeń & colleagues summarise the key outcomes & discussions of the 2025 Cryospheric Ecosystems Conference Meeting review: journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...

A group photograph of the in-person attendees of the Cryospheric Ecosystems Conference 2025, held at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 24

FlyClimber: a new user-friendly, automated method to measure Drosophila motor coordination. Callan Sharples & Petros Ligoxygakis describe their set-up friendly method that is robust while still maintaining high accuracy and sensitivity. Learn more: doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 21

Matt Bell, Alex Wan & co reveal that juvenile European lobsters exhibit a strong and consistent preference for black and red background colours. journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...

Colour preferences measured via various design parameters in sub-trial 1. (A-C) Mean (A) and total (B) duration in each chamber, and colour preference ratio (C). In mean duration and colour preference, long horizontal bars represent the mean, and short horizontal bars represent ±s.d. Different letters indicate significant differences among experimental groups (Friedman test, followed by Dunn's multiple-comparisons test, P<0.05); N=60. No statistical comparison was conducted for total duration, as these values represent cumulative data across all individuals.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 20

Madeline Smith & co show that, in mice, malnutrition-related glucocorticoids may preferentially preserve naïve CD4+ T cells by intrinsically redirecting them to the bone marrow, where they undergo less apoptosis. journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...

Malnutrition intrinsically alters naïve CD4+ T cells to home to the bone marrow. (A) Pan naïve T cells were isolated from MAL (Thy1.1−) and AL (Thy1.1+) donor mice, mixed in a 50:50 ratio, and labeled with CFSE before retro-orbital injection into AL (Thy1.1−) or MAL (Thy1.1−) recipients. Two hours later, flow cytometry was used to determine the percentage of AL and MAL donor cells in the lymph nodes and bone marrow of recipients.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 19

Alice Dufour and colleagues characterise the properties of LiCre, which, in response to blue light, can switch on or off whatever gene is close to a specific DNA sequence called LoxP. journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...

Analysis of LiCre:DNA binding in vivo. (A) Hypothetical principle of LiCre photoactivation. The chimeric α helix is presented as a rectangle; in blue when folded as the Jα helix of LOV2 and in green when folded as the αA helix of Cre. Modified from Duplus-Bottin et al. (2021). (B) Chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) experimental setup. (C) Position of qPCR-amplified regions P1, P2 and P3 relative to loxP on the synthetic construct integrated in chr2 of strain GY2416.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 19

Metabolite trafficking between organelles is widespread, yet many trafficking routes remain poorly understood. Now, Mone Shibata & co provide a dynamic model for organelle-level metabolite trafficking. journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...

A model of BV trafficking and bilirubin distribution. BR, bilirubin; BV, biliverdin; HO, heme oxygenase; NADPH, nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 17

Prachi Joshi, Arnav Saha and colleagues set out to characterise proteins that regulate Golgi morphology of cancer cells in a manner dependent on their adhesion status. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

MCF7 cells expressing ManII-GFP reveal a disorganized Golgi architecture under suspended conditions. The image is represented in 16-colour mode.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 16

To find out more about this research, read our interview with Katie Barnes, a PhD student in Laura Knoll's lab at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA, investigating novel & efficient model systems for studying intracellular microbes. doi.org/10.1242/bio....

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 16

Katie Barnes & co identify conditions and protocols for optimal growth of a specific skin cell type, derived from mouse ears. Consistent conditions yield more reliable and reproducible science. journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...

Workflow for mouse ear tissue collection and processing for primary fibroblast culture. (A) Ear tissue was collected from 16-week-old female C57BL/6J mice following humane euthanasia in accordance with institutional guidelines. (B) The tissue was washed in 70% ethanol, rinsed in phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) supplemented with 1% penicillin–streptomycin (P/S), and then mechanically disrupted with razor blades. The minced tissue was transferred to PBS+1% P/S containing the Liberase enzyme and digested for 90–120 min at 37°C with rotation. (C) After digestion, the remaining tissue fragments were removed by filtration, and the cell pellet was washed to remove residual enzyme in minimal media (DMEM+10% FBS). Cells were seeded into a T25 cell culture flask and left undisturbed for 3 days to aid cell adhesion. Created in BioRender by Knoll, L. J. (2026). https://BioRender.com/62oxy8p. This figure was sublicensed under CC-BY 4.0 terms.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 12

Read more about this research in our interview with Guang Yang, who completed this research while a PhD student in Ryota Uehara's lab at Hokkaido University, Japan. journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 12

In this study, Guang Yang & co analyse more than 150 cell lineages from newly generated whole-genome duplication cells and find that fewer than 10% of lineages survive long term. journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...

Example of live images (left) and lineage tracing (right) of post-WGD cell. (Left) The entire view of the lineage and magnified views of individual cells are shown in the top and bottom, respectively. The initial post-WGD cells are shown in panel a. Representative cells that experienced bipolar (b,c) or multipolar chromosome segregation (d,e) in the previous mitosis are also shown. (Right) Markers indicated different mitotic patterns. Progenies were colour-coded by cell fate.

Biology Open@biologyopen· Jun 11

To learn more about this research, read our interview with first author José Ignacio Quesada Márquez, who conducted this research while an undergraduate research assistant in Rafael Lucena Hernández's lab at the University of Seville, Spain. journals.biologists.com/bio/article/...