Microscopy preprints – applications in biology

Posted by FocalPlane, on 13 November 2026

Here is a curated selection of preprints published recently. In this post, we share preprints that use microscopy tools to answer questions in biology.

Dynamic mechanical sorting biases niche occupancy and lineage outcome during development of bilayered glandular epithelia
Robin P. Journot, Tom Deshayes, Louise Harari, Alexandre Barthelemy, Vasudha Srivastava, Candice Merle, Claudia Carabana, Marisa M. Faraldo, Philip Allan Seymour, Martti Maimets, Zev J. Gartner, Jean-Léon Maître, Kim B. Jensen, Silvia Fre

Mitotic centromeres organize in repeat-subunits with specialized histone landscape and multi-domain architecture as revealed by expansion microscopy
Gokilavani Thangavel, Sylvia Erhardt

The Application of 3D Cryo-Volume Electron Microscopy to Visualize and Quantify the Photosynthetic Filamentous Cyanobacterium Anabaena
Allyson Angermeier, Lolita G. Rotkina, Clara Lebow, Wah Chiu, Tessa M. Burch-Smith, Kirk J. Czymmek

Cargo levels control endosomal PI(3)P homeostasis through direct feedback between SNX17 and MTM1
Lewis Hancock, Ben Allouis, Anwar Sadat, Ruby Peters, Rebeka Butkovic, Alexander P Walker, Francesca Bottanelli, Peter J Cullen, Hannes Maib

Figure extracted from Hancock, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY-NC 4.0 International license.

Light-sheet fluorescence microscopy of optically cleared human head-and-neck organs: three-dimensional tissue assessment and histological correlation
Lisa D.J. Schiffelers, Mari F.C.M. van den Hout, Ioana Gabor, Albert Bitorina, Elias Wieland, Taisiya Ageeva, Andreas Herrler, Zohaib Salahuddin, Francesco Missale, Anna Schueth

Calcium and actomyosin pulses drive tricellular zipping to remodel epithelial cell-cell junctions and facilitate cell packing
Babli Adhikary, Xinran O. Zhao, Ashley Shahi, Andrea G. Laboy-Figueroa, Michaela P. Purvis, Katherine K. Tjoelker, Tyler R. Huycke, Shiladitya Banerjee, Adam C. Martin, Ann L. Miller

Mitochondria-Coupled Hitchhiking Drives Vimentin Intermediate Filament Transport
Bhuvanasundar Renganathan, Andrew Moore, Stephen A Adam, Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz, Vladimir I. Gelfand

Species-specific WNT requirements shape somite morphogenesis in mammalian embryo models
Charlotte Knight, Luke Simpson, Cinzia Allegrucci, Catherine L.R. Merry, Ramiro Alberio

Figure extracted from Knight, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

Fluorescence Lifetime Imaging Microscopy (FLIM) reveals the diversity and complexities of an open ocean photosymbiosis
Nicole L Coots, Leocadio Blanco-Bercial, Iliana H. Cutten, Cove Beaven, Patrick J Keeling

Systems-level imaging reveals assembly and synaptic delivery of a multi-organelle ensemble during T cell killing
Akaash Kumar, Jane C. Stinchcombe, Gillian M. Griffiths

Figure extracted from Kumar, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

Nuclear speckles comprise hierarchical nanoscale interaction networks that shape molecular dynamics
Minxue Liu, Tianyou Yao, Jonas Zähringer, You Jin Song, Qingcai Meng, Daiki Futagi, Astrid D. Haase, Steven H DeVries, Susan M. Freier, Supriya G. Prasanth, Taekjip Ha, Ido Golding, Kannanganattu V. Prasanth

A developmentally scheduled inhibitory polarity circuit centers the stomatal pore
Alexis Lebecq, Eva-Sophie Wallner, Dominique C. Bergmann

Figure extracted from Lebecq, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

Correlation of Live Imaging and Fixed-Expansion Microscopy to study intracellular pathogens
Jennyfer Trouve, Aljoscha Janis Jung, Marek Basler

Adaptation of Iterative Ultrastructure Expansion Microscopy (iU-ExM) enables high-resolution imaging of the cytoskeleton and subcellular architecture of Trypanosoma cruzi
Normanda Souza-Melo, Giovanna Henriques de Souza, Sharmila Ortiz, Wanderley de Souza

Rearrangement of chromosome spatial organization in mouse zygotes using optical tweezers does not affect preimplantation development
Corentin Mollier, Ozan Kastas, Laure de Chancel, Julia Roensch, Lorena Kolar-Znika, Anne de Cian, Maxime Dahan, Daniele Fachinetti, Antoine Coulon, Jean-Léon Maître

TMEM55B promotes anterograde transport and distal axonal distribution of LAMP1-positive organelles
Sönke Rudnik, Chun Hei Li, Dieter-Christian Gottschling, Alexander Veh, Daniel J. Barbosa, Julia Richter, Stijn Stroobants, Björn Schuster, Inken M. Beck, Radislav Sedlack, Robert Häsler, Mara Riechmann, Frank Döring, Paul Saftig, Rudi D’Hooge, Katsuji Yoshioka, Reto Gassmann, Ginny G. Farias, Markus Damme

The physical state of the nucleus tracks its function across eukaryotes
Mirko Pleitner, Abin Biswas, Janek Uhlich, Simone Reber

Far-Red Light Photoacclimation Rewires Antenna-Photosystem Organization in Cyanobacterial Cells
Sofie van Dorst, Vera M. Selinger, Dennis J. Nürnberg, Wojciech Wietrzynski, Benjamin D. Engel

Figure extracted from van Dorst, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

The AP-1 clathrin adaptor has a conserved role in recycling resident proteins of the trans-Golgi network
Fernando M. Valbuena, Maddison Lessard, Adam H. Krahn, Areti Pantazopoulou, Conor F. Lee-Smith, J. Christopher Fromme, Petia Adarska, Francesca Bottanelli, Benjamin S. Glick

Shoot to root transport of the HY5 transcription factor drives root developmental plasticity under neighbour shade
Kyra van der Velde, Ahmad Ali, Valérie Hoogers, Franziska Stamm, Alena Patnaik, Omar Heliel, Douwe Rietveld, Tuğba Akyuz, Katarzyna Retzer, Jan Petrašek, Ronald Pierik, Kasper van Gelderen

LipiGo: A Versatile DNA-Lipid Nanoparticle Hybrid for Precision Drug Delivery
Karoline Kadletz, Ceren Kimna, Valentin Kenneth Reichenbach, Olga Carofiglio, Denise Jeridi, Igor Khalin, Ying Chen, Izabela Horvath, David-Paul Minde, Mayar Ali, Taras Sych, Sofia Hu, Luciano Hoeher, Eren Aydeniz, Yagmur Ayse Kulcu, Jakub Grzejdak, Alessio Ricci, Erdinc Sezgin, Nikolaus Plesnila, Arthur Liesz, Siegfried Ussar, Farida Hellal, Markus Elsner, Ali Ertürk

A Col22a1-EGFP reporter reveals dynamic three-dimensional organization of the myotendinous junction
Yuki Yamasaki, Yutaro Kawa, Ramu Sagasaki, Shunki Yashiro, Joonseop Shin, Mizuki Mishima, Kohei Arakawa, Hayate Suzuki, Seiya Mizuno, Kanon Otsuka, Tadayoshi Hayata, Chisa Shukunami, Masafumi Inui

A combinatorial pre-mRNP retention factor network couples nuclear speckle architecture to splicing quality control
Kerstin Dörner, Kai Kurth, Nicole Beuret, Nikolaus Beer, Michael K. Jones, Karen Davey, Lea Stadelmann, Dominik Hügli, Alexia Ferrand, Giulia Basile, Seraphine Lüscher, Jernej Ule, Franka Voigt, Maria Hondele

Plasticity-induced actin polymerization positions endocytic compartments at the bases of stimulated spines
V. C. Wong, D. Walpita, Z. J. Liu, E. K. O’Shea

Templated seeding induces the formation of Alzheimer paired helical tau filaments in human brain organoids
Mehtap Bacioglu, Taxiarchis Katsinelos, Manuel Schweighauser, Filomena Gallo, Karin H. Müller, Rafailia Christou, Janine Brandes, Sofia Lövestam, Sally A. Cowley, William A. McEwan, Sjors H.W. Scheres, Michel Goedert, Maria Grazia Spillantini

Templated paired helical filament formation and tau fold-dependent inclusion morphologies in primary neurons
Melissa Huang, Sofia Lövestam, Kimberly Ai Xian Cheam, Bernardino Ghetti, William A. McEwan, Sjors H. W. Scheres, Michel Goedert

Figure extracted from Huang, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

4D confocal microscopy of time dependent cell and nuclear osmotic response reveals differential osmoregulation and transport kinetics
Iqra Azam, Dominic J. Olver, James D. Benson

Tissue mechanics sets developmental scaling of collective cell migration
Boris Guirao, Aurélien Villedieu, Julien Delpierre, Fabian Gärtner, Lale Alpar, Isabelle Gaugué, François Graner, Floris Bosveld, Yohanns Bellaïche

Migrasomes May Originate from Cilia and Represent an Alternative Ciliary Form
Siyu Zhang, Abudurexiti Kutibiding, Mengci Wang, Yi Yang

Vac8-driven vacuolar remodeling primes mega-autophagy and safeguards gamete developmental competence
Tianyao Xiao, Benjamin S. Styler, Elçin Ünal

Giant Vesicle Platform for Synthetic Endoplasmic Reticulum Networks
Cade Vallero, Shreya Pramanik, Tsu-Wang Sun, Miroslaw Tarnawski, Joachim P. Spatz, Rumiana Dimova, Reinhard Lipowsky

Intravital single-molecule microscopy reveals protein kinetics in live mammalian tissues
Marco Heydecker, Desu Chen, Andrius Masedunskas, Melissa Mikolaj, Kedar Narayan, Jiji Chen, Harshad Vishwasrao, Tobias Meckel, Edna Hardeman, Peter Gunning, Roberto Weigert

High-throughput light-sheet 3D microscopy of whole rodent brain microstructure for integration with MRI
Jenna M. Hanmer, Francesco D’Antonio, Stephania Assimopoulos, Jose-Pedro Manzano-Patron, Sydney C. Wood, Mohamed Tachrount, Qijia Shen, Martin Craig, Cyril Lai, Graham J. Hickman, Edalat Radfar, Kim I. Chisholm, Tracy D. Farr, Alan Jasanoff, Anna Hoerder-Suabedissen, Zoltan Molnar, Clemence Ligneul, Cristiana Tisca, Saad Jbabdi, Amy F.D. Howard, Karla L. Miller, Elizabeth de Guzman, Jason P. Lerch, Stamatios N. Sotiropoulos

Correlative light and electron microscopy identifies circuit motifs underlying processing of noisy visual motion in larval zebrafish
Jonathan Boulanger-Weill, Florian Kämpf, Gregor F. P. Schuhknecht, Richard L. Schalek, Roberto Garza, Mariela Petkova, Sumit Kumar Vohra, Yuelong Wu, Jay H. Savaliya, Robert Tiller, Kristian J. Herrera, Heike Naumann, Maren Eberle, Simone Rencken, Moritz Stingl, Alina Hebling, Dana Hockling, Katja Slangewal, Zixuan Deng, Ruohong C. Wang, Lauren L. Zhang, Kim N. Kirchberger, Isaac H. Bianco, Daniel Baum, Adrienne L. Fairhall, Filippo Del Bene, Florian Engert, Jeff W. Lichtman, Armin Bahl

Figure extracted from Boulanger-Weill, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY-NC 4.0 International license.

Peripheral Axons Form Endoplasmic Reticulum-Rich Conduits With Breast Cancer Cells
Neşe Ayşit, Şükriye Bilir, Esra Altıntaş, Fatih Toy, Mehmet Şerif Aydın, Hasan Korkaya, Gürkan Öztürk

Losing the split ends: unraveling the mechanisms of fiber branching during blood clot formation
Aravind Elangovan, Dylan M. Miller, Can Cai, Key Crosley, Heather A. Belcher, Rachel M. Lee, Chad M. Hobson, David M. Hart, Martin Guthold, Brittany E. Bannish, Nathan E. Hudson

Direct visualization of lysosome-mediated intracellular transport and membrane anchoring of TNF-α in human T cells
Alyssa Burgess, Hirushi Gunasekara, James Xie, Ying S. Hu

Mitochondrial PEX14 supports peroxisome biogenesis
Britta Nemeita, Anne Sophie Hammann, Suraj Karki, Tolga Soykan, Livia Wieland, Martin Lehmann, Sven Thoms

Ultrastructurally planar growth cones during neocortical axon navigation
Yu Nakanishi, Masafumi Tsuboi, Hiroki Kawai, Koyo Shibayama, Kenta Yamauchi, Sasikarn Looprasertkul, Kyungeun Lee, Hajime Komaki, Takamitsu Egashira, Shogo Suga, Tomonari Murakami, Kenichi Ohki, Hiroyuki Hioki, Nobuhiko Ohno, Hidenobu Mizuno, Yusuke Hirabayashi

Cellular-resolution Three-photon Ultra-Deep Imaging (TrUDI) of neuronal population activity at 2 mm depth in the mammalian brain
Kalyan Santra, Francesca Logiacco, Agustina Frechou, Kevin Barber, Arash Bellafard, Jyun-you Liou, Alipasha Vaziri

Presynaptic PMCA interacts with Dlg, regulating in vivo synaptic calcium in Drosophila larval NMJ
Andrés Köhler-Solís, Estefanía López, Eduardo Quiroz, Oliver Kobler, Andrés González-Gutiérrez, Ulrich Thomas, Jimena Sierralta

Super-resolution mapping of platelet α-granules uncovers non-polarized secretion and differential retention of VWF and thrombospondin-1
Smita Patil, Joran Deschamps, Massimiliano Garre, Shreya Sankar, Jonas Ries, Ingmar Schoen

Intracellular genomic variability driven by cellular compartmentalization in the giant bacterium Achromatium spp
Danny Ionescu, Joana Mariz, Kai Bukoff, Elene Tskitishvili, Marit Grüner, Laura Oroz Villegas, Sophie-Luise Heidig, Thomas Stach, Julian Hennies, Dietrich Walsh, Anna M. Steyer, Christian Wurzbacher, Mina Bizic

Plasmodium rootlet SFA1 coordinates cell replication, apical polarity and cytoskeletal organisation during sexual development
Declan Brady, Akancha Mishra, Philip Ilani, David J. P. Ferguson, Prince Ubiaru, Robert Markus, Andrew Bottrill, Mohammad Zeeshan, Sue Vaughan, David S. Guttery, Eelco C. Tromer, Anthony A. Holder, Rita Tewari

Figure extracted from Brady, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

Progressive Actomyosin Remodeling Defining a Structured Podocyte Injury Response in Nephrotic Syndrome
Ewa Langner, Karla Parra, Shumeng Jiang, Sanjay Jain, Moe R. Mahjoub, Guy M. Genin, Jeffrey H. Miner, Hani Y. Suleiman

Macrophages use sub-micron actin ridges in phagocytosis of encapsulated fungal pathogens
Jaime Cañedo, Mahrukh Shameem, Laura Martinez-Campesino, Chiara Niespolo, Taghreed Shamrani, James Bradford, Yin Xin Ho, Lynne R. Prince, Jason S. King, Endre Kiss-Toth, Heather L. Wilson, Rhoda J. Hawkins, Simon A. Johnston

Figure extracted from Cañedo, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

Organelle Volume Facilitates Spindle Positioning During C. elegans Female Meiosis
Denisa G Lazureanu, Eric Krueger, Wei Qiu, Aspen A Kopley-Smith, Clive S Smith, Alma P Aquino, Aastha Lele, Nadiia Voloshchuk, Daniel B Cortes, Mooncheol Park, Kunihiro Uryu, Malan Silva, Eric Trautman, Michael Innerberger, Stephan Preibisch, Roman Vaxenburg, Alyssa K Stark, Christopher K. E. Bleck, Molly Reilly, Meng C. Wang, Hari Shroff, Francis J McNally

Figure extracted from Lazureanu, *et al.* The image is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.

KIF1A-driven entry of degradative lysosomes into the axon is developmentally regulated by the microtubule environment at the axon initial segment
Nireekshit Addanki Tirumala, Surbhi Verma, Juan S. Bonifacino

Pathogenic DRP1 variants reveal a role for biomolecular condensation in mitochondrial fission
Kyle A. Ross, Amanda M. Travis, Megan C. Harwig, Micaela S. Young, Erica H. Rodas Montejo, Matthew J. Farah, Michael J. Donohue, Robert W. Taylor, Monika Oláhová, R. Blake Hill

Phagocytosis without mitochondria is a lineage trait of planctomycetal bacteria of prey
Carmen E. Wurzbacher, Jonathan Hammer, Tom Haufschild, Begüm Serra Büyüktarakçı, Alejandro Jiménez González, Feriel Bouderka, André R. Soares, Julian M. Müller, Luis Felipe Muriel-Millan, María Leticia Ferrelli, Vivien Hotter, Martin Taubert, Kirsten Küsel, Damien Devos, Andreas Klingl, Alexander J. Probst, Siv G. E. Andersson, Nicolai Kallscheuer, Christian Jogler

A dsRNA Virus Converts Early Endosomes into Stable Replication Organelles Through Maturation Arrest and Retrograde Transport
Maria Cecilia Gimenez, Diego Ferrero, Mariam Issa, Serene Moussaoui, Micaela Cabrini, Amanda Rebouças Paixão, Liyuan Liu, Suriakarthiga Ganesan, Durga Acharya, Mandy Boermel, Vanina Zaremberg, Nuria Verdaguer, Mauricio Roberto Terebiznik

A reversible temperature block captures pre-lysosomal intermediates of starvation-induced ERphagy
Marco Fabbro, Tatiana Soldà, Diego Morone, Carmela Galli, Andrea Raimondi, Maurizio Molinari

P2K1 P2K2 are required for early, mechanical adaptation to osmotic and cell wall stress in Arabidopsis roots
Dhika Amanda, Oscar Badias, Luis Alonso Baez, Maarten Besten, Joris Sprakel, Thorsten Hamann

Serpin A3 is Increased in Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy and ARIA
Lissa Ventura-Antunes, Vaibhav A. Janve, Neely Womble, Conor J. Weasler, Sahir A. Hai, Hosamulhaq Brula, Bret C. Mobley, Timothy J. Hohman, Wilber Romero-Fernandez, Matthew S. Schrag

Alternative organelle targeting of OPA1 mediates fatty acid release from lipid droplets
Xiao Li, MaryEllen R. Haas, Dennis Voronin, Rikshita Bhattacharyya, Jonathon Klein, Woo Jung Cho, Camenzind G. Robinson, Robert E. Throm, Gang Wu, Chang Li, Yadav Sapkota, Natalie M. Niemi, Shondra M. Pruett-Miller, Joseph T. Opferman, Chi-Lun Chang