Nicolás Vidal-Vázquez (@vidalvazquezn)

Inhibitory neurons are among the most transcriptomically diverse class of neurons in the CNS, with some brain regions having 60+ distinct cell types. Do humans share the same repertoire as rodents? Birds? Fish? 1/13

10.03.2026 02:43 👍 62 🔁 25 💬 3 📌 4

Thrilled to share that our preprint has been accepted in Science Advances! Grateful to an incredible team & collaborators.

Link: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

👏 @annaferraioli.bsky.social @maikekittelmann.bsky.social
@msarscentre.bsky.social @erc.europa.eu @hfspo.bsky.social #ctenophores

04.03.2026 20:49 👍 66 🔁 16 💬 2 📌 2

Muller glia (green) regulate local retinoic acid signalling to specialise photoreceptor outer segments (magenta)for high acuity visual function

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.

03.03.2026 16:20 👍 33 🔁 11 💬 1 📌 1

Final version @nature.com of our paper describing unconventional multicellular development in a choanoflagellate inhabiting an extreme environment. A ton of new data since the first @biorxivpreprint.bsky.social preprint (which we've kept updating).

A brief 🧵 (carried over from the old place)

28.02.2026 08:12 👍 369 🔁 150 💬 16 📌 16

A cell fate specification and transition mechanism for human foveolar cone subtype patterning | PNAS In the central region of the human retina, the high-acuity foveola is notable for its dense packing of green (M) and red (L) cones and absence of b...

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/...

25.02.2026 17:47 👍 27 🔁 11 💬 3 📌 1

The molecular evolution of vertebrate organs Nature Ecology & Evolution - This Review discusses recent advances in the molecular evolution of vertebrate organs, including rates of evolution of organs and cell types, molecular mechanisms...

Our internal organs are evolutionary marvels. New technologies are transforming our understanding of the evolution of vertebrate organs. You can find more by reading here:
rdcu.be/e5EgU
#EvoBio #EvoDevo 🐟🦎🐢🦇🐊🦜

25.02.2026 12:29 👍 140 🔁 52 💬 2 📌 5

Out now in @currentbiology.bsky.social!

A dive into the deep history of vertebrate vision, together with @mikebok.bsky.social, @neurofishh.bsky.social and @denilsson.bsky.social

Photo credit : Vasilis Karkalas

23.02.2026 17:55 👍 46 🔁 22 💬 3 📌 0

Evolution of monoamine reception and its role in cellular contractility.

How do #sponges coordinate their bodies despite lacking neurons and true muscles?

We show that sponges use monoamines to control water flow in their canals — reminiscent of how adrenaline regulates blood vessels.

My PhD story, now on BioRxiv:
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
#Evolution

18.02.2026 13:34 👍 62 🔁 21 💬 3 📌 4

1/10 ⏰⏰ New stuff from me &
@tjnear.bsky.social
! We show that sharks themselves might not be a natural group ... it depends on what spots in the genome you analyze!

Preprint here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

15.02.2026 20:30 👍 55 🔁 21 💬 2 📌 4

Hᴏᴡ ᴅᴏ ʏᴏᴜ ʙᴜɪʟᴅ ᴀ ʙʀᴀɪɴ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴄᴀɴ ᴄᴏɴqᴜᴇʀ ʟᴀɴᴅ, ᴀɪʀ, ᴀɴᴅ ꜱᴇᴀ? 🧠 It’s not just about adding new parts; it’s about "tinkering" with what’s already there! Our new review dives into Evo-Devo and how small developmental tweaks create many brain forms🦎🐦

11.02.2026 14:01 👍 5 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 0

Abstract submission and registration for the *10th Euro Evo Devo Meeting 2026* at University of Glasgow (June 8-12, 2026) is open. Early bird deadline: March 5, 2026. More info: https://www.evodevoconference26.com/ #conference

07.02.2026 23:11 👍 7 🔁 9 💬 0 📌 1

Oriented cell divisions induce basal progenitors and regulate neural expansion across tissues and species A fundamental role for division orientation in progenitor output driving cortical and retinal growth is revealed.

Happy to announce that our latest paper is now out! Have you ever wondered how neural tissues control their size? In this paper, we show that cell division orientation is critical in both the cortex and retina. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

04.02.2026 19:16 👍 92 🔁 31 💬 5 📌 2

Spatiotemporal coordination of Slit-Robo repulsion and neurturin-Gfrα attraction guides multipolar migration during retinal lamination Multipolar migration is a conserved neuronal migration mode in the developing brain, enabling emerging neurons to navigate in crowded environments and…

Check out the tour de force by @jalehtimaki.bsky.social in its final form: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... . An elegant combination of transcriptomics, F0 screens and high end imaging unravels the cues that guide cells (here retinal horizontal cells) in an increasingly crowded tissue. #proudPI

04.02.2026 09:43 👍 49 🔁 16 💬 2 📌 2

Our new paper: Entropy Sorting Feature Selection (ESFS)

A computational framework for gene selection from single cell data that extracts biological signals in noisy data while avoiding artefacts from conventional dimensionality reduction

A thread
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

03.02.2026 18:44 👍 26 🔁 12 💬 1 📌 1

And finally, we have It out! Do not miss It, If you are into early eye development, GRNs, and eye malformations. Thanks to Javier Macho and the rest of the authors for a terrific job.

02.02.2026 20:23 👍 19 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 1

Morphological, molecular, and functional evidence for a CNS-like oral nerve ring in the sea anemone Nematostella vectensis The emergence of centralized nervous systems reflects a major inflection point in evolution, enabling animals to integrate diverse inputs and coordinate complex behaviors. Neural centralization is typically associated with Bilateria, whereas their sister group, Cnidaria (jellyfish, anemones, and corals), has long been thought to rely on diffuse nerve nets mediating simple reflexes. This view, reinforced by limited anatomical and molecular data, has left unresolved whether cnidarians can form localized centers for neural processing, a question sharpened by the growing recognition of their diverse behavioral repertoires. Here we show that the sea anemone Nematostella vectensis possesses an oral nerve ring composed of ganglion-like condensations, a hallmark of centralized organization. These neurons are enriched for excitatory, inhibitory, and modulatory receptors but lack sensory or ciliary markers, yielding a molecular profile most consistent with bilaterian interneurons. Genetic disruption of a conserved inhibitory receptor subunit predominantly expressed in the oral nerve ring delayed the initiation of swallowing in a novel feeding paradigm, demonstrating a potential role in behavioral regulation. Together, these findings provide converging anatomical, molecular, and functional evidence that cnidarians can assemble localized integrative centers, suggesting that key elements of neural centralization predated the cnidarian–bilaterian split. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. Stowers Institute for Medical Research

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

30.01.2026 05:40 👍 9 🔁 2 💬 1 📌 0

🧠✨ Older neurons get richer connections in the human brain!
Our new paper is out in Nature Communications.
We reveal a fundamental link between ᴅᴇᴠᴇʟᴏᴘᴍᴇɴᴛ ⛓️ ʙʀᴀɪɴ ꜱᴛʀᴜᴄᴛᴜʀᴇ & ꜰᴜɴᴄᴛɪᴏɴ in the human connectome 🧵👇

30.01.2026 09:36 👍 19 🔁 3 💬 4 📌 0

We are thrilled that our study on the evolution of gene regulation in mammalian cerebellum development – led by @ioansarr.bsky.social, @marisepp.bsky.social and @tyamadat.bsky.social, in collaboration with @steinaerts.bsky.social – is now out in @ScienceMagazine! www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

29.01.2026 19:23 👍 92 🔁 35 💬 3 📌 6

ESFS: A Noise-Resilient Framework for Feature Selection and Marker Gene Discovery in Single-Cell Transcriptomics Single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) has transformed our ability to resolve cellular heterogeneity, but extracting meaningful signals remains challenging due to technical noise, batch effects, and the limitations of current feature selection methods. We present Entropy Sorting Feature Selection (ESFS), a modular, user-friendly framework that captures multivariate gene expression relationships without imputation or denoising via latent spaces. Across diverse datasets, ESFS improves interpretability and reveals biology missed by standard workflows: identifying coherent developmental programs in eight independent human embryo datasets without batch integration; resolving spatial gene expression in mouse colon obscured by conventional analyses; distinguishing shared and tumour-specific microenvironments in glioblastoma; and disambiguating spatial, temporal, and neurogenic programs in the developing mouse neural tube. By operating in gene expression space, ESFS produces interpretable, biologically meaningful outputs while reducing artefacts introduced by feature extraction. These results position ESFS as a powerful means to uncover relevant molecular signatures in noisy, high-dimensional transcriptomics data. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. Cancer Research UK, CC001051 Medical Research Council, https://ror.org/03x94j517, CC001051 Wellcome Trust, CC001051 Wellcome Trust, 220379/D/20/Z European Molecular Biology Organization, 792-2021 UK Research and Innovation, EP/X031225/1

Our latest: A gene selection method for single-cell RNA-seq that identifies developmental & spatial patterns missed by other analysis pipelines

ESFS: A Noise-Resilient Framework for Feature Selection and Marker Gene Discovery in Single-Cell Transcriptomics | bioRxiv www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

28.01.2026 05:59 👍 29 🔁 9 💬 0 📌 0

🧬Euro Evo Devo 2026🦖
University of Glasgow, 9–12 June 2026.

Registration is now open!
Deadline: Thursday, 5 March 2026
registrations.hg3conferences.co.uk/hg3/frontend...

We are organising Symposium S08: “Integrative Perspectives on Craniofacial Evo-Devo”.
We welcome contributed talk submissions!

17.01.2026 00:16 👍 7 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 0

Resolving forebrain developmental organisation by analysis of differential growth patterns - Nature Communications Experiments on the embryonic chick brain reveal distinct directional growth patterns and a tripartite hypothalamus, challenging the classic segmented prosomere model and offering an updated view of ho...

Excited to finally share the final/final.doc version of our paper. It's been a journey, but very proud of the result. Well done to all involved, especially @elsieplace.bsky.social

@kchinnaiya.bsky.social , @thomasdwkim.bsky.social, @sethblackshaw.bsky.social 👏👏

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

26.01.2026 10:23 👍 15 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 0

I am thrilled to share our collaborative work @amphispacelab.bsky.social on the evolution of FoxQ2 genes, now out in @commsbio.nature.com! 🧬🥳

Thank you so much to everyone involved! 🤩 And please feel free to reach out if you have any question or comment!

22.01.2026 16:20 👍 7 🔁 2 💬 1 📌 1

Four camera-type eyes in the earliest vertebrates from the Cambrian Period - Nature Early vertebrates, particularly myllokunmingids, possessed four camera-type eyes (a pair of lateral eyes and pineal and parapineal organs), which indicates that these structures functio...

New paper presenting rather compelling evidence that the stem-vertebrate Haikouichthys had paired lateral and supranumerary medial eyes (!!!), and proposing that the medial eyes may have deep homology with the pineal and parapineal organs.

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

21.01.2026 17:47 👍 66 🔁 30 💬 2 📌 8

Investigate regeneration and repair using whole animals or organ/tissue systems at EMBO Workshop "The molecular and cellular basis of #regeneration and #TissueRepair" in #Krems, AT, 21–25 Sep 2026.

Deadline: 20 May

https://meetings.embo.org/event/26-tissue-repair
#EMBORegeneration #EMBOevents 🧪

14.12.2025 08:45 👍 26 🔁 16 💬 0 📌 1

🧠 Cortical Evolution 2026
📍 Bilbao, Spain | 🗓 June 15–17, 2026
Join us for an international meeting on the evolution, development & organization of the cerebral cortex.
More information coming soon 👀
🔗 www.ventricular.org/corticalevolution26
#CorEvo26

19.01.2026 08:57 👍 9 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 0

Finally out! We studied the retinas of the longest-living vertebrate, the Greenland shark, and found that the retinas remain remarkably healthy in animals around 150 years old. What is the mechanism? It may be a highly efficient DNA repair system. Enjoy!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

06.01.2026 01:40 👍 213 🔁 85 💬 7 📌 11

🌊 El proyecto SHOW-IT, en el que participa ARCUS ha sido seleccionado como uno de los 11 proyectos financiados a nivel mundial por la institución BNP Paribas Foundation dentro de su Climate & Biodiversity Initiative 2025, entre 168 propuestas de 21 países 🌍.

22.12.2025 14:18 👍 3 🔁 3 💬 1 📌 0

Very proud of this new paper from the lab! Work by the magnificent Andrea Adden and many brilliant collaborators illuminate how moth and butterfly brains have evolved in light of different ecologies. Freely available here: rdcu.be/eVR3B; @lundvision.bsky.social @biologylu.bsky.social

22.12.2025 16:24 👍 67 🔁 20 💬 3 📌 0

Really happy to join NeuroPSI at Paris Saclay to lead a research group funded by an ERC Consolidator grant #ERCCoG . We'll study the origins of the vertebrate brain using shark embryos. 🦈 🧠 Reach out if you are interested in joining the team 🤍

22.12.2025 07:47 👍 71 🔁 12 💬 12 📌 0

Ever wanted to know how the visual system of a long distance migratory moth looks like? Then you'll find your answers in our new paper. Finally out, after about a decade of collecting data by a group af amazing co-authors. Find it here, open access: link.springer.com/article/10.1...

18.12.2025 14:16 👍 63 🔁 25 💬 6 📌 3

Nicolás Vidal-Vázquez

Latest posts by Nicolás Vidal-Vázquez @vidalvazquezn