It's been a pretty good week for the obrownlab.com. We had a nice lab lunch to celebrate the end of the semester. InWord received the prestigious Henry Rutgers Scholar award for her honors thesis research in the lab, and it's my birthday!
Natasha O'Brown
Had a great time visiting WashU today and reconnecting with some old friends! Tony gave me the sweetest introduction that only 16 years of knowing me could achieve.
Had such a fun night with these ladies after an amazing day at #asn2026 @megancphd.bsky.social @laurafontenas.bsky.social @jcoutinhobudd.bsky.social and Sarah and Claudia with no bluesky. On to the last day and a bunch of our talks today.
Natasha O'Brown
I created this collection of common brain models in neuroscience, all to scale
Across species, brains share fundamental principles and many homologous regions
But as size increases, complexity and connectivity change. We need the full spectrum, from flies to rodents, non-human primates, and humans
Natasha O'Brown
'We primarily do comparative analysis using human stem cells/organoids and genetically modified mouse models, with some minor use of frog models. We use this approach because, for developmental anomalies, it is impossible to assess true function without in vivo models'
@karenjliu.bsky.social
Summary: The call to arms for alternatives to model organisms of disease will fail without ongoing integration with – and validation against – complex animal models and support from the animal modelli...journals.biologists.com
For anyone who is a scientist or has benefitted from basic research on model organisms (that's EVERYONE), please take the time to leave a comment about priority 1 here: rfi.grants.nih.gov?s=6998c3a23e... by the deadline May 28! I know I wouldn't be here today without modern medicine
Starting #asn2026 right with @jcoutinhobudd.bsky.social and Sarah Ackerman (not pictured but driving us lushes around town)
What fun could be had!
Jean Laurens
I had such a good time visiting #UVA this week. Good views, good wine, good food, and great people. Thanks @jcoutinhobudd.bsky.social for hosting me and letting me crash lab meeting!
New preprint from my lab! Will Anderson developed a transgenic #zebrafish ubiquitously expressing an optogenetic FGF/ERK activator. We're having a lot of fun with it and think you will too! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
