Stem-cell niche articles from across Nature Portfolio

Elucidating the gastroesophageal junction’s development is key to comprehending its disease susceptibility. Here, the authors mapped its development, uncovering cellular diversity and interaction dynamics using advanced spatiotemporal single-cell analysis.

The authors describe stem cell-derived bone marrow organoids that accurately model the structural and functional properties of the human bone marrow niche.

The establishment of the postnatal skeletal muscle stem cell pool is not well understood. Here the authors show a requirement for Nf1 to coordinate muscle fiber growth and stem cell quiescence induction, and to prevent detrimental metabolic reprogramming with life-long consequences.

We established a method to generate complex self-organizing bone marrow-like organoids (BMOs) via concomitant differentiation of human induced pluripotent stem cells. These BMOs consist of hematopoietic cells, stromal niche cells and de novo vascular networks. In addition, they contain multipotent hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells, as well as mesenchymal stem and progenitor cells; they model aspects of the three-dimensional bone marrow architecture and can be used to study developmental and aberrant hematopoiesis.

The cellular microenvironment and interplay between cell types are essential for cardiac renewal. Combined single-cell and single-nucleus sequencing, spatial transcriptomics and loss-of-function experiments in constitutively YAP-expressing infarcted hearts reveal a cellular triad and complement signaling that evoke renewal of heart muscle.

McCarthy et al. identify distinct populations of smooth muscle cells in the intestine that support the establishment of the intestinal stem cell niche during postnatal development by supplying trophic signals to enable niche expansion.

Contraction of the hair follicle-lining dermal sheath smooth muscle generates the forces necessary for the tissue remodelling that takes place during the regression phase of the hair growth cycle. This study reveals that endothelin signalling — from epithelial progenitors at the follicle bottleneck region to its neighbouring dermal sheath — is the main contraction-activating pathway.

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