Microscopy preprints: applications in biology

Posted by FocalPlane, on 5 October 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.

Extensive loss of HoxA/D genes does not disrupt anterior vertebral patterning in zebrafish
Taisei Tani, Akiteru Maeno, Hidemichi Nakazawa, Towa Fujibayashi, Kaito Suda, Akinori Kawamura

Uncoupling microtubule lifetime, stability and post-translational modifications
Tanguy Chocat, Benoit Vianay, Flora Silberzan, Jérémie Gaillard, Louise Bonnemay, Alexandre Schaeffer, Laurent Blanchoin, Manuel Théry

The life cycle of an archaeon with multiple membranes
Florian Mayer, Andriko von Kügelgen, Richard Stöckl, Veronika Seitz, Joe Parham, Zhexin Wang, Robert Reichelt, Tanmay A.M. Bharat, Harald Huber, Anja Spang, Dina Grohmann, Buzz Baum

Native in situ architecture of the human inactive X chromosome revealed by correlative light and electron microscopy
Barbara Hübner, Mei Ling Wee, Harvey Yin Seng Chan, Sara Sandin, Alexander Ludwig

Cytoskeletal disassembly by optogenetic control of RhoA signaling termination
Erin E. Berlew, Jude Barakat, Paula Camacho Sierra, Joel D. Boerckel

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

Cryo-EM reveals the central steps of mitochondrial complex III assembly and the cooperative assembly of supercomplex CIII2CIV
Ahad Ali Kazmi, Andrea Gottinger, Marine S. Huhardeaux, Andrea Stärk, Beatrix Santiago-Schübel, Emma J. Fenech, Irene Vercellino

A synaptic wiring diagram underlying modality-specific ascending pathways of the superficial spinal dorsal horn
Wangchu Xiang, Ramin Khajeh, Kevin Delgado, Jingyi Liu, Adrian Holtrup, Qiyu Zhang, Sidrick Cameron, Tri Nguyen, J. Alex Bae, Akhilesh Halageri, Nico Kemnitz, Thomas Macrina, Borja Moya Llamas, Alice Schildkamp, Mohd Freezely Mazri, Julianne Ni, Ruairi Roberts, Laia Serratosa Capdevila, Ruoming Wang, Amelia Dsouza, Aliya Norton, Songyang Wang, Dong Zhang, Paul Lindu Tang, Seungwon Choi, Wei-Chung Allen Lee, David D. Ginty

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

Cell type-resolved connectomic reconstruction of the spinal dorsal horn reveals sensory neuron synaptic organization and modality-specific inhibition
Wangchu Xiang, Kevin Delgado, Qiyu Zhang, Josef Turecek, Adrian Holtrup, Ramin Khajeh, Tri Nguyen, J. Alex Bae, Akhilesh Halageri, Nico Kemnitz, Thomas Macrina, Dong Zhang, Sidrick Cameron, Borja Moya-Llamas, Mohd Freezely Mazri, Julianne Ni, Ruairi Roberts, Alice Schildkamp, Laia Serratosa Capdevila, Aliya Norton, Jingyi Liu, Mingguan Liu, Sven Dorkenwald, David L Paul, David D Ginty, Wei-Chung A Lee

Local mechanical heterogeneity drives epidermal cell delamination
Andreas Schoenit, Jérémy O’Byrne, Cécile Daubech, Winfried Schmidt, Lucas Anger, Yuan Shen, Matthias Rübsam, Risai Dubrall, Fanny Wodrascka, Raphaël Voituriez, Benoît Ladoux, Carien M. Niessen, René-Marc Mège

Curvature-guided chiral collective organization of myoblast tissues
Yuan Shen, Rushikesh Shinde, Wang Xi, Sushil Dubey, Yoann Le Toquin, Joanna Da Costa Oterelo Martins, Lucas Anger, Andreas Schoenit, Gianluca Grenci, Christophe Marcelle, René-Marc Mège, Raphael Voituriez, Andrew Callan-Jones, Benoit Ladoux

Choreographed morphogenetic events underlie early foregut development in the mouse embryo
Jenny Kretzschmar, Guillermo Serrano Nájera, Sonia Agüera-Gonzalez, Henry Westmacott, Casper van Bavel, Pranay Shah, Lara Krasinska, Tom Smith, Rob Jelier, Katie McDole

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

Connecting adhesion dynamics and trail formation in malaria parasites by imaging the major surface antigens CSP and TRAP
Kevin Walz, Mirko Singer, Leon Lettermann, Yvonne Sokolowski-Adams, Carolina Thieleke-Matos, Sylvia Olberg, Magdalena C. Unterreiner, Christine Selhuber-Unkel, Vibor Laketa, Ulrich S. Schwarz, Friedrich Frischknecht

Confocal and Transmission electron microscopy imaging of Orientia tsutsugamushi
Meenakshi Rana, Suvradeep Mitra, Mohan Kumar Hanumanthappa, Navneet Sharma, Manisha Biswal

Wnt/beta-catenin signaling regulates Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor (VEGF) receptors in central nervous system endothelial cells
Yanshu Wang, Ningyu Zhu, Amir Rattner, Philip M. Smallwood, Jeremy Nathans

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

Intranuclear niche: actin-tail mediated nuclear entry by intracellular pathogens
Hoi Ching Cheung, Patricia Reist Iscar, Miro Thorsten Wilhelm Plum, Marek Basler

Extracellular matrix context shapes morphogenesis and lactation-associated states in human milk-derived mammary organoids
Amelia Hasenauer, Valerie Pascetta, Maxwell C. McCabe, Anthony J. Saviola, Simone Ponta, Mehmet Yilmaz, Verena Bossung, Christina L. Coelius, Thomas Biesgen, Kirk C. Hansen, Stefan Prekovic, Nicole Ochsenbein-Koelble, Marcy Zenobi-Wong

The unhindered lateral mobility of a rhomboid intramembrane protease enables synapse remodelling
Anna Bodzęta, Adam G. Grieve

The Extracellular Matrix Regulates Tissue Mechanics to Enable Cyclic Lymph Node Remodelling for Sustained Immunity
Veronika Lachina, Pablo Vicente-Munuera, Amy Llewellyn, Spyridon Makris, Agnesska C. Benjamin, Kalnisha Naidoo, Yanlan Mao, Sophie E. Acton

Cnidarian oocytes reveal conserved actin-driven mechanisms of female meiosis
Yamini Vadapalli, Komal Bhattacharyya, Sascha Lambert, Bishal Samanta, Antonio Z. Politi, Stefan Klumpp, Peter Lenart

Single-molecule imaging of DNA repair and cytoplasmic rigidification in intracellular bacteria
Fiona Anne Sargison, Nicolas Chérif Ducrot, Clara Kummerer, Claire Qu, Treasa B O’Hagan, Elliott Haywood, Anju Kudhail, Amy Moores, Lindsay Baker, Stephan Uphoff

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

Molecular and cellular characterization of the interaction between the Rho GAP RGA-3/4 and F-actin
Songeun Kim, Kevin J. Sonnemann, Andrea A. Putnam, William M. Bement

A moving front of osteoblast maturation scales regenerating zebrafish bone
Konrad Marx, Simone Cicolini, Delphine Colevret, Coline Coudeville, Guillaume Salbreux, Alessandro De Simone

Engineered dual-gastruloid model for foregut-pharyngeal mesoderm co-development
Giada Mura, Michiel Tawdarous, Patrícia Duarte, Florian Mueller, Alexandre Mayran, Ingo Burtscher, Heiko Lickert, Shahragim Tajbakhsh

Lack of centrosomes limits the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition in human mammary cells
Maria Lucia Pigazzini, Johanna Melisa Tocci, Mathias Boulanger, Ferris Jung, Vladimir Benes, Ingrid Hoffmann, Niccolò Banterle

Pentachloropseudilin disrupts multiple steps of the Toxoplasma gondii lytic cycle, consistent with predicted multi-myosin engagement
Isabelle TARDIEUX, Romane AGRESTI, Faraj GTAT, Guillaume DRUMONT, Bastien TOUQUET, Christopher SWALE

Rapid repurposing of microvillar content drives a flagellate-to-amoeboid switch in the closest relative of animals
Maite Freire-Delgado, Diede de Haan, Stéphane Tachon, Anastasia D. Gazi, Mylan Ansel, Eva K. Pillai, Marvin Albert, Chantal Combredet, Audrey Salles, Jean-Yves Tinevez, Thibaut Brunet

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

STED microscopy reveals mitotic stage-dependent CENP-A organization
Thomas C.Q. Burgers, Sietse J. Dijt, Luca Vitrano, Geert van den Boogaart, Rifka Vlijm

High-resolution microscopy of whole plant cells reveals virus-induced changes to intercellular connectivity
Brandon C. Reagan, Allyson Angermeier, Samantha P. Nuzzi, Mazen Alazem, Andrea A. Zanini, Alejandro Lugo Saaverda, Colten Nichols, Lolita Rotkina, Kirk J. Czymmek, Tessa M. Burch-Smith

Live-cell imaging and ultrastructure expansion microscopy reveal the dynamic intracellular life cycle of Encephalitozoon intestinalis
Kacie McCarty, Sabrina Absalon, Gira Bhabha, Damian Ekiert

Cross-scale Imaging of Live Botanical Specimens using Fourier Ptychographic Microscopy
Laura Copeland, Lewis D. Walker, Katherine Baxter, Mike Shaw, Gail McConnell

Fluorescence Lifetime Imaging Microscopy (FLIM) as a method to elucidate trends in marine planktonic symbioses
Nicole L Coots, Leocadio Blanco-Bercial, Iliana H. Cutten, Cove Beaven, Patrick J Keeling

Density-Dependent Rearrangement of Desmoplakin in Epithelial Junctions: Insights from Expansion Microscopy
Ukyo Kawasaki, Yusuke Arakawa, Tetsuhisa Otani, Kazumasa Ohashi, Shuhei Chiba

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

Multimodal 3D imaging reveals a central role for lysosomes in dissolution of cholesterol crystals by macrophages
Vibeke Akkerman, Alice Dupont Juhl, Jacob M. Egebjerg, Christoph Pratsch, Stephan Werner, Gerd Schneider, Tido Willms, Peter Müller, Sergey Kapishnikov, Daniel Wüstner

MHC Molecules on B Cell Microvilli Are Spatially Associated with IL-15Rα
István Rebenku, Noémi Bilakovics, Levente Szolyka, Lukas Velas, Tamás Garda, Gerhard J. Schütz, György Vámosi

Cell-envelope conduits enable transfer of megabase-sized double-stranded DNA between cells of the nosocomial pathogen Acinetobacter baumannii
Sina Manger, Clara Börnsen, Sara Garcia Torres, Pauline Roth, Julian Sommer, Ashwin Balakrishnan, Felix Langschied, Celina Thiel, Inga Hänelt, Mike Heilemann, Stephan Göttig, Ingo Ebersberger, Klaas M. Pos, Achilleas S. Frangakis

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

MINFLUX-nanoscopy of hNAIP/NLRC4 inflammasome activation in single human macrophages
Susanne Kulnik, Alexander Westerkamp-Carsten, Jonas Lübbe, Shuting Yin, Antonio Virgilio Failla, Martin Aepfelbacher

Quantitative super-resolution imaging with deep learning segmentation reveals early mitochondrial network remodeling and altered mitochondria-lysosome interactions in Pompe disease muscle
Ibrahim Hassani, Johan Deniaud, Chantal Thorin, Tony Fiore, Laurence Dubreil, Karl Rouger, Marie-Anne Colle

Native-State Imaging Reveals Spatially Separated Organized Cells and Strain-Specific Matrix Architecture in Pseudomonas aeruginosa Biofilms
Goodness O. Osondu-Chuka, Guruprakash Subbiahdoss, Stephan Schandl, Aleksandr Ovsianikov, Olivier Guillaume, Erik Reimhult

Single molecule detection of Tau seeds in extracellular vesicles from Alzheimer’s disease brains
Dalya Gulseren, Anaïs Bécot, The brain bank NeuroCEB Neuropathology Network, Christian G Specht, Mehdi Kabani

Discovery of the Honeycomb Synapse in Spinal Motor Circuits
Matthew J. Broadhead, Carlotta Löer, Janine Malseed, Katarina Parascandolo, Ani Ayvazian- Hancock, Anna N. Bak, Emma Butler, Molly Roberts, Simon A. Sharples, Leandro Lemgruber, Anthony Dornan, Jessica Valli, Bartosz Wasicki, Marcin Bączyk, Edita Bulovaite, Gábor Varga, Noboru H. Komiyama, Seth G.N. Grant, David I. Hughes, Claire F. Meehan, Gareth B. Miles

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

LGR5 and SOX2 expressing progenitor cells in the adult and aged human and mouse inner ear have the potential to produce Myosin 7A positive cells in vitro
Georgina E. Fenton, Tobias Pieper, Cindy Cleypool, Stephanie Sgroi, Francis Rousset, Cecilia de Heus, Nalan Liv, Hans G.X.M. Thomeer, Pascal Senn, Robert J. Stokroos, Louise V. Straatman, Natalia Smith-Cortinez

A 3D Soft X-Ray Structural Atlas of Multicellular Cable Bacteria
Anaísa Coelho, Aneesh Deshmukh, Valentina Loconte, Magdalene A. MacLean, Carolyn A. Larabell, Mohamed Y. El-Naggar

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

The Actin Cytoskeleton and Caveolae Regulate MERTK Cleavage by ADAM17
Rachel A Nicholson, Angela Vrieze, Bryan Heit

Dystrophic changes of nigrostriatal axons harboring a Synj1 Parkinson mutation suggest catastrophic failure of endocytic mechanisms
Yumei Wu, Peng Xu, James Moran, C. Shan Xu, Kenneth J. Hayworth, Mian Cao, Lin Shao, D. James Surmeier, Harald F. Hess, Pietro De Camilli

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

Ultrastructural dynamics of basal bodies during microgamete formation and fertilisation in Plasmodium
Molly Hair, Ryuji Yanase, David J P Ferguson, Declan Brady, Richard Wheeler, Rita Tewari, Sue Vaughan

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

TSPAN3 defines a distinct intracellular trafficking route to secretory multivesicular bodies
Jelle van den Bor, Misko Bobeldijk, Christopher A. Zala, M. Cristina Trueba Sanchez, Clara Lalo, Bárbara Adem, Jochanan A. Maaijen, Emma M. A. Bundock, Nikki A. Weijers, Elly Soltani, Cecilia de Heus, Pascal W.T.C. Jansen, Wenyi Zheng, Samir El Andaloussi, Nalan Liv, Annemiek van Spriel, Kelly Stecker, Ihor SmaI, Guido van Mierlo, Frederik J. Verweij

Lysosome-related organelle genes are required for mitochondrial transformations during bacterial infections in Caenorhabditis elegans
Jennifer D. Cohen, Ken Nguyen, David H. Hall, Frederick M. Ausubel, Gary Ruvkun

Remodeling of sporozoite microtubules during Plasmodium liver stage development
Kodzo Atchou, Magali Roques, Ruth Rehmann, Reto Caldelari, Melanie Schmid, Simone Grossi, Bianca Manuela Berger, Torsten Ochsenreiter, Friedrich Frischknecht, Volker Heussler

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

Adhesion-clutch drives three-dimensional axon outgrowth
Hongjia Chen, Zhen Qiu, Saki Yamada, Akinori Murakami, Takunori Minegishi, Naoyuki Inagaki

A genetically encoded RhoG FRET biosensor reveals spatially compartmentalized RhoG–Rac1 signaling during cell protrusion
Maíra de Assis Lima, Abigail Thomas, Roshan Ravishankar, Rafael Garcia-Mata, Gaudenz Danuser, Veronika Miskolci, Dianne Cox, Louis Hodgson