A. Leonard

One for the road: Bumble bees consume pollen at flowers

This study shows bumble bees consume pollen directly from flowers to assess its quality for the colony, not just for personal nutrition.

Black Dots: Microcontact-Printed, Reference-Free Traction Force Microscopy

This paper introduces a traction force microscopy technique called 'black dots' to measure cellular forces without constraining cell shape, finding that higher force correlates with increased spread area, circularity, and F-actin uniformity in platelets.

C-STEM: ENGINEERING NICHE-LIKE MICRO-COMPARTMENTS FOR OPTIMAL AND SCALE-INDEPENDENT EXPANSION OF HUMAN PLURIPOTENT STEM CELLS IN BIOREACTORS

This study develops a bioreactor system using microfluidic microcapsules to enhance hPSC expansion, achieving a 282-fold amplification in 6.5 days.

Identifiability of speciation times under the multispecies coalescent

This paper shows that branch lengths in fixed species trees with three or four taxa are identifiable and develops estimators and a hypothesis test for delimiting species under the coalescent model.

Functional Maturation of Human iPSC-based Cardiac Microphysiological Systems with Tunable Electroconductive Decellularized Extracellular Matrices

This study develops tunable electroconductive hydrogels to enhance maturation of hiPSC-derived cardiac tissues, showing improved contractile and electrophysiological function and drug response.