Congrats to Ryan Freund, an undergrad in our lab, who won the JHU McEllroy Award for his research on human retinal organoids, RGCs, and Notch!

and we got the cover!!

Excited to share our new paper! This work explores how Sonic hedgehog signaling helps coordinate retinal patterning and neurogenesis, including regulation of both cell cycle exit and progenitor competence during mammalian eye development journals.biologists.com/dev/article/...

I'm so excited and fortunate that Brooke Weingard, Carsten Hoeke, and Danielle Gardon are joining our lab to pursue their PhDs!! Can't wait for their awesome fly and organoid work!

Huge congratulations to Vil Fernandes for being awarded the Lister Prize! Amazing talk as always!

Interesting test for AI: You know what you should prioritize next. Ask your favorite AI to guess what that is. I am giving a talk tomorrow at ARVO and need to prep. It took AI 6 guesses (with some hints) to get there. I'd love to hear how it works for others!

From photoreceptors to visual processing — #Webvision is your open-access deep dive into how we see. Now hosted at our Department, continuing its mission to make vision science accessible to all. Start exploring → www.webvision.pitt.edu#Webvision #Ophthalmology #Neuroscience

I will be at ARVO and have a poster 3006 - 0256, May 5th at 1:15. Hope to connect with you all vision people!

I had a great time visiting Iowa last week, and it was fantastic to catch up with outstanding alums from our PhD program who are out there doing amazing things! @shyamraji.bsky.social @eannemartin.bsky.social

Our new paper is out! 🎉 Let-7 doesn’t act through a single pathway: it controls neocortical neuron fate and migration via distinct downstream mechanisms, with RBX2 dedicated to migration. A new layer of post-transcriptional control shaping cortical development www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Check out our new paper where @simonomisz.bsky.social tackles the challenge of understanding the relationship of cell death and the loss of RGCs in human retinal organoids. This paper is an important step in understanding how to design better organoids! www.cell.com/cell-reports...

Thanks so much to Michael and Michel (M&M?) for this awesome summary that makes our work look "epic"!!

Check out this "epic" summary of our recent paper from Michael Housset and @michelcayouette.bsky.social ! www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Neurodevelopment is such a fun field because so much is new to explore and define. But also that means it can be unclear. In our new review out this week @cp-trendsneuro.bsky.social, we try to synthesize the confusing field of neural intermediate progenitors authors.elsevier.com/a/1msKvbotqB...

Here's the link to the online OA version: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

FASEB Retinal Neurobiology: Celebrate 30+ years of research on cellular and molecular mechanisms that drive vision, retinal function, and degeneration. Join keynote Massimo Scanziani alongside organizers Wei Li and Wei Wei. Submit your abstract by April 13 and register now: hubs.ly/Q047K6gk0

I defended my PhD 10 years ago today. That was the least remarkable thing that happened that day. Sharing something I wrote about it last year. Since then "the horrors persist but so do we." And with dignity.

Read about it here

Amazing new work from the Hurd lab:Sperm keep their mitochondria but lose their mitochondrial genomes. This new preprint identifies the nuclease responsible — and shows it reads DNA structure, not sequence. tinyurl.com/3npwwk37

Well some of us are. Many top neuro journals straight up desk reject model organism papers nowadays. And if you want to get fast, detailed and precise mechanistic answers - some of these are still the best systems.

Love eyes? Love awesome science? Love fantastic colleagues? Join us in Maine on August 9-14 for the GRC Visual System Development Conference! It's one of the best!

Excited to share our new manuscript from the Yoshimatsu and MacDonald labs. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6.... We found that my favourite glial cells can regulate local retinoic acid signalling to specialise cone photoreceptors for high acuity visual function.

Proud to have been part of this work.

Congrats on a nice paper !! Watch out for our Commentary coming out soon!

JHU wrote a nice story summarizing our recent studies of human foveola patterning using human retinal organoids. Come for the science, stay for the super closeup of me looking through a petri dish. hub.jhu.edu/2026/02/18/r...

I'm excited to share our PNAS paper from 1st author Kasia Hussey. We study how the foveola, the high acuity region of the retina, is patterned by RA and TH. We were surprised to find that cone subtypes appear to convert fates. Our studies are important for AMD sufferers. www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Vision Science makes the front page of NYT!! featuring work from @neurofishh.bsky.social and @denilsson.bsky.social with comments from Berkeley's own @karthikshekhar.bsky.social #visionscience www.nytimes.com/2026/02/23/s...

From our new paper out now in @currentbiology.bsky.social: www.cell.com/current-biol... w/ @neurofishh.bsky.social @gkafetzis.bsky.social @denilsson.bsky.social Looking across animals, the vertebrate eye is an obvious outlier. Why is it so different that other highly visual animals?

New preprint in collab with Capelson & Schindler labs): Nuclear pore complexes are developmentally removed and rebuilt during oocyte specification. Blocking turnover prevents gene silencing and meiotic entry. Nuclear architecture renewal is required for cell fate. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

🌟 Meet the Scientific Committee: @blockintheback.bsky.social🌟 Kristen Kwan is a member of the Scientific Committee of #EZM2026, and we are thrilled to have her join us in Vienna! Stay tuned as we continue to introduce the outstanding scientists of EZM2026! 🐟🧬

Very interesting study from the Schweisguth lab - Pulsatile dynamics propagate crystalline order in the developing Drosophila eye: Developmental Cell www.cell.com/developmenta...

Great news!

My department, Duke Neurobiology, is searching for a new chair. Ad below. Come work with me, @jmgrohneuro.bsky.social @ennatsew.bsky.social @jorggrandl.bsky.social @jnklab.bsky.social @sbilbo.bsky.social @neurocircuits.bsky.social and many other amazing folks! @dukemedschool.bsky.social

Check out this story! Atlantic writer Alexandra Petri visited my lab and played with some fruit flies and human organoids as she wrote about experiencing things that were affected by government cuts. www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

Here you go! www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

Check out this story! Atlantic writer Alexandra Petri visited my lab and played with some fruit flies and human organoids as she wrote about experiencing things that were affected by government cuts. www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

Nice summary on our paper on mechanisms controlling development and evolution of the cone-dominant ground squirrel retina, which is now in final form at eLife. www.lifescienceeditors.com/2026/01/06/h...

G+D together with JHU worked to put together this cool video describing our latest work! Check it out!

I'm so excited that @christ3na.bsky.social 's paper describing temporal control of photoreceptor development in human organoids is out at Genes and Dev and we got the cover! genesdev.cshlp.org/content/40/1... genesdev.cshlp.org/content/40/1...

Nothing like a paper acceptance right before New Years! The Johnston lab will be sharing some of our best work ever in 2026! Next update coming on Jan 1!

🧬👁️ Our Science Advances paper is published! snATAC-seq analysis across lamprey to human retina uncovers deeply conserved cis-regulatory codes in all six retinal cell types — even with extensive enhancer turnover. Immensely grateful to my coauthors and collaborators. 🙏 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Recent Hopkins Hub article highlighting our work on optic nerve regeneration in axolotl. Congratulations to Ted! hub.jhu.edu/2025/12/11/s...

Mosquitoes, a photo gallery:

Excited to announce that the newest paper from my lab on the Drosophila visual system is out today! Modulating the levels and activity of the retinal determination network is sufficient to induce the specification of distinct tissue fates in Drosophila url: journals.biologists.com/dev/article-...

It was an honor being interviewed about our new color vision project by the 'Eye on Vision' WYPL Memphis radio show! 🪰👀🧪 @umassboston.bsky.social eyeonvision.blogspot.com/2025/11/hmx-...

Just a heads up: I just got a phishing attempt pretending to be from the #VisualSystemDevelopment #GRC. It looked pretty convincing at first glance, so be careful!

No more paylines at the NIH grants.nih.gov/news-events/...

My department at Dartmouth Medical School is hiring a tenure-track Assistant Professor. We are looking broadly for a biochemist or cell biologist. Please share this add! apply.interfolio.com/171438 @dartmouthbcb.bsky.social @futurepislack.bsky.social

Now out in Cell! Congratulations to all involved, especially @chiarafornetto.bsky.social For a breakdown, see the bluetorial from when we posted the preprint: bsky.app/profile/neur... Funding: @erc.europa.eu @wellcometrust.bsky.social @ukri.org @leverhulme.ac.uk @thelisterinstitute.bsky.social

Today’s speaker in our DRN external seminar series is Dr Ryan MacDonald @macdonaldlab.bsky.social (University College London) Sponsored by the Physiological Society @physoc.bsky.social Host: Emily Noël @noelresearchlab.bsky.social All welcome!