Codestin Search App

Marine phytoplankton face eco-evolutionary pressure to regulate their vertical position in the ocean to access light, which is abundant towards the surface, and nutrients, which are found deeper down the water column. All phytoplankton experience gravitational sinking, which can contribute to their vertical migration. However, the biophysical and molecular mechanisms that impact gravitational sinking have not been systematically characterized across taxa and environmental conditions. Here, Wu et al. combine simulations with measurements of cell mass, volume, and composition to investigate the effects of nutrient availability on gravitational sinking in nine representative unicellular pico- and nanoplankton species. They find that gravitational sinking becomes faster in most species when starved, but the biophysical changes responsible for this vary across species and starvation conditions. For example, the faster sinking of Chaetoceros calcitrans is nearly exclusively driven by cell density whereas that of Emiliania huxleyi is due to cell volume. Overall, their work reveals that phytoplankton physiology has evolved multiple mechanisms that impact gravitational sinking in response to starvation, possibly to support the vertical migration of the cell. This scanning electron microscopy image of Tetraselmis sp., a green alga, portrays the sinking of the cell following starvation.

Image Credit: Teemu Miettinen, Margaret Bisher, Abigail Lytton-Jean

Editorial

The body sends a signal: Perspectives on interoception

Lucas K. Smith, on behalf of the PLOS Biology staff editors

PLOS Biology: published November 14, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003517

Essay

Bacterial immune systems as causes and consequences of microbiome structure

Rafael Custodio, Ellinor O. Alseth, Michael A. Brockhurst, Sam P. Brown, Edze R. Westra

PLOS Biology: published November 19, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003489

Perspectives

Beyond the buzz: Grounding interoceptive interventions in mechanisms of brain–body coupling

Daniel S. Kluger, Teresa Berther, Martina Saltafossi, Jana Fehring, Joachim Gross

PLOS Biology: published November 13, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003439

Does the liver talk to the brain? If so, how and why?

Young-Hwan Jo

PLOS Biology: published November 13, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003491

Interoception as a central mechanism in Whole Person Health

Wen G. Chen, Helene M. Langevin

PLOS Biology: published November 13, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003487

In defense of pleasure: We need to rethink food reward and obesity

Justin J. Sung, Dana M. Small

PLOS Biology: published November 13, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003497

Primers

Does oxygen limitation set thermal limits in aquatic ectotherms?

Diana Madeira

PLOS Biology: published November 5, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003441

When the brain talks back to the eye

Dominic Gonschorek, Thomas Euler

PLOS Biology: published November 5, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003454

The details and entropy demons in a transmembrane allosteric machine

Ben F. Luisi

PLOS Biology: published November 26, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003485

Nanobody-drug conjugates for targeting specific GPCR pairs

Xianglin Huang, Bryan L. Roth

PLOS Biology: published November 21, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003483

Research Articles

Evolving life-history traits promote biodiversity via eco-evolutionary feedback mechanisms

P. Catalina Chaparro-Pedraza, Claudia Bank

PLOS Biology: published November 12, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003492

Enrichment of root-associated Streptomyces strains in response to drought is driven by diverse functional traits and does not predict beneficial effects on plant growth

Citlali Fonseca-Garcia, Dean Pettinga, Daniel Caddell, Hannah Ploemacher, Katherine Louie, Benjamin P. Bowen, Joelle Park, Jesus Sanchez, Alen Zimic-Sheen, Matthew F. Traxler, Trent R. Northen, Devin Coleman-Derr

PLOS Biology: published November 26, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003526

Diverse biophysical and molecular mechanisms drive phytoplankton sinking in response to starvation

Yanqi Wu, Vieyiti K. Kouadio, Thomas R. Usherwood, Justin Li, Margaret Bisher, Reshum Aurora, Aaron Z. Lam, Alice R. Lam, Abigail K. R. Lytton-Jean, Scott R. Manalis, Teemu P. Miettinen

PLOS Biology: published November 19, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003508

Collaborative rule learning promotes interbrain information alignment

Denise Moerel, Tijl Grootswagers, Genevieve L. Quek, Sophie Smit, Manuel Varlet

PLOS Biology: published November 25, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003479

Eye blinks synchronize with musical beats during music listening

Yiyang Wu, Xiangbin Teng, Yi Du

PLOS Biology: published November 18, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003456

A framework to determine active neurons and networks within the mouse brain reveals how brain activity changes over the course of the day

Guanhua Sun, Tomoyuki Mano, Shoi Shi, Alvin Li, Koji L Ode, Alex Rosi-Andersen, Erica Pedron, Steven A. Brown, Hiroki R Ueda, Konstantinos Kompotis, Daniel B. Forger

PLOS Biology: published November 13, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003472

Transient frontopolar cortex stimulation induces prolonged disruption to counterfactual processing

Matthew Ainsworth, Juan M. Galeazzi, Carlos Pedreira, Mark G. Stokes, Mark J. Buckley

PLOS Biology: published November 18, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003495

The central histaminergic system slows visual processing in the retina and lateral geniculate nucleus of awake mice

Matteo Tripodi, Hiroki Asari

PLOS Biology: published November 4, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003406

Cardiac, respiratory, and gastric rhythms independently modulate motor corticospinal excitability in humans

Tahnée Engelen, Teresa Schuhmann, Alexander T. Sack, Catherine Tallon-Baudry

PLOS Biology: published November 12, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003478

Sleep deprivation and sleep intensity exert distinct effects on cerebral vasomotion and brain pulsations driven by the respiratory and cardiac cycles

Sara Marie Ulv Larsen, Sebastian Camillo Holst, Anders Stevnhoved Olsen, Brice Ozenne, Dorte Bonde Zilstorff, Kristoffer Brendstrup-Brix, Pia Weikop, Simone Pleinert, Vesa Kiviniemi, Poul Jørgen Jennum, Maiken Nedergaard, Gitte Moos Knudsen

PLOS Biology: published November 20, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003500

Oxytocin neurons drive melanocortin circuit maturation via vesicle release during a neonatal critical period

Pierre-Yves Barelle, Fabienne Schaller, Soyoung Park, Emilie Caron, Jessica Klucznik, Phillipe Ciofi, Françoise Muscatelli, Sebastien G. Bouret

PLOS Biology: published November 12, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003158

Episodic memory involves transient and sparse connectivity aligned to both internal and external events

Adam J. O. Dede, Zachariah R. Cross, Samantha M. Gray, Joseph P. Kelly, Qin Yin, Parisa Vahidi, Eishi Asano, Stephan U. Schuele, Joshua M. Rosenow, Joyce Y. Wu, Sandi K. Lam, Jeffrey S. Raskin, Jack J. Lin, Olivia Kim McManus, Shifteh Sattar, Ammar Shaikhouni, David King-Stephens, Peter B. Weber, Kenneth D. Laxer, Peter Brunner, Jarod L. Roland, Ignacio Saez, Fady Girgis, Robert T. Knight, Noa Ofen, Elizabeth L. Johnson

PLOS Biology: published November 25, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003481

Electrical Spinal Imaging: A noninvasive, high-resolution approach that enables electrophysiological mapping of the human spinal cord

Giulio Gabrieli, Richard Somervail, André Mouraux, Massimo Leandri, Patrick Haggard, Gian Domenico Iannetti

PLOS Biology: published November 26, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003116

Cardiometabolic health and physical robustness map onto distinct patterns of brain structure and neurotransmitter systems

Eliana Nicolaisen-Sobesky, Somayeh Maleki Balajoo, Mostafa Mahdipour, Agoston Mihalik, Mahnaz Olfati, Felix Hoffstaedter, Janaina Mourão-Miranda, Masoud Tahmasian, Simon B. Eickhoff, Sarah Genon

PLOS Biology: published November 21, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003498

Context-dependent activation of V1 parvalbumin interneurons enhances visual discrimination

Lilia Kukovska, Katharina A. Wilmes, Natsumi Y. Homma, Claudia Clopath, Jasper Poort

PLOS Biology: published November 25, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003518

Amyloid precursor protein modulates cerebellar Purkinje cell activity and motor function through regulation of Nav1.6 currents

Miao-Jin Ji, Tong-Xuan Wu, Chenhao Tian, Xiang Cao, Ruyuan Wei, Yin-Yin Yang, Xinran Meng, Huanyao Tang, Tiantao Cui, Jiao Yang, Xin Tang, Chao Liu

PLOS Biology: published November 24, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003513

Environmental noise-induced changes to the IC-SNc circuit promotes motor deficits and neuronal vulnerability in a mouse model of Parkinson’s Disease

Chi Cui, Yibo Yao, Yulong Shi, Jie Lei, Kun Ren, Kexing Wan, Tongxia Li, Gangan Luo, Qian Xu, Ming Li, Xiang Peng, Xueke Yang, Jian Yang, Junsong Du, Sitong Chen, Bo Tian, Pei Zhang

PLOS Biology: published November 4, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003435

Large-scale seroepidemiology uncovers nephro-urological pathologies in people with tau autoimmunity

Andreia D. Magalhães, Marc Emmenegger, Elena De Cecco, Manfredi Carta, Karl Frontzek, Andra Chincisan, Jingjing Guo, Simone Hornemann, Adriano Aguzzi

PLOS Biology: published November 26, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003488

A common pathway controls cell size in the sepal and leaf epidermis leading to a nonrandom pattern of giant cells

Frances K. Clark, Gauthier Weissbart, Xihang Wang, Kate Harline, Chun-Biu Li, Pau Formosa-Jordan, Adrienne H. K. Roeder

PLOS Biology: published November 3, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003469

Foxi2 and Sox3 are master transcription regulators that control ectoderm germ layer specification in Xenopus

Clark L. Hendrickson, Ira L. Blitz, Amina Hussein, Kitt D. Paraiso, Jin S. Cho, Michael W. Klymkowsky, Matthew J. Kofron, Ken W. Y. Cho

PLOS Biology: published November 4, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003476

The planarian dorsal–ventral boundary regulates anterior–posterior axis growth and patterning

Chloe L. Maybrun, Isaac M. Oderberg, Michael A. Gaviño, Thomas F. Cooke, Kyungyong Choi, Jongyoon Han, Peter W. Reddien

PLOS Biology: published November 11, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003482

The blood–brain barrier regulates brain tumor growth through the SLC36 amino acid transporter Pathetic in Drosophila

Qian Dong, Edel Alvarez-Ochoa, Phuong-Khanh Nguyen, Paul Orih, Natasha Fahey-Lozano, Hina Kosakamoto, Fumiaki Obata, Cyrille Alexandre, Louise Y. Cheng

PLOS Biology: published November 18, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003496

RNA-binding protein IMP1/ZBP1 directs local translation in microglial processes to regulate motility and phagocytosis during inflammation

Josune Imaz-Iruretagoyena, Maite Blanco-Urrejola, Irene Núñez-García, Irene García-Toledo, Luis C. Fernández-Beltrán, Mar Márquez, Silvia Corrochano, Amanda Sierra, Jimena Baleriola

PLOS Biology: published November 10, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003463

Chromosome duplication causes premature aging via defects in ribosome quality control

Leah E. Escalante, James Hose, Jamie M. Ahrens, Hollis Howe, Norah Paulsen, Sofia J. Liss, Michael Place, Audrey P. Gasch

PLOS Biology: published November 17, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003509

Hydroxyurea induces an oxidative stress response that triggers ER expansion and cytoplasmic protein aggregation

Ana Sánchez-Molina, Manuel Bernal, Joel D. Posligua-García, Antonio J. Pérez-Pulido, Laura de Cubas, Elena Hidalgo, M.-Henar Valdivieso, Silvia Salas-Pino, Rafael R. Daga

PLOS Biology: published November 19, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003493

The cell cycle regulator PLK1 promotes murine melanoma progression by regulating the transcription factor BACH1

Fengyi Mao, Sai Wu, Derek B. Allison, Daheng He, Yifan Kong, Chaohao Li, Zhiguo Li, Yanquan Zhang, Xinyi Wang, Qiongsi Zhang, Chi Wang, Xiaoqi Liu

PLOS Biology: published November 24, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003490

The novel GlcNAc 6-phosphate dehydratase NagS governs a metabolic checkpoint that controls nutrient signaling in Streptomyces

Chao Li, Mia Urem, Ioli Kotsogianni, Josephine Lau, Chao Du, Somayah S. Elsayed, Nathaniel I. Martin, Iain W. McNae, Patrick Voskamp, Christoph Mayer, Sébastien Rigali, Navraj Pannu, Jan Pieter Abrahams, Lennart Schada von Borzyskowski, Gilles P. van Wezel

PLOS Biology: published November 25, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003514

The RNA-binding protein RBM39 scaffolds an m⁶A-dependent RNA decay complex that destabilizes Tat transcripts and restricts HIV-1 reactivation

Xiaohui Deng, Siyi Xie, Mo Zhou, Quyu Yuan, Shuangxin Wu, Peiming Huang, Minghua Chen, Jianteng Zeng, Pengle Guo, Jie Qin, Cancan Chen, Jiaye Liu, Bingfeng Liu, Xin He, Liqin Sun, Hui Zhang, Linghua Li, Ting Pan

PLOS Biology: published November 11, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003486

RNG2 tethers the conoid to the apical polar ring in Toxoplasma gondii to enable parasite motility and invasion

Romuald Haase, Bingjian Ren, Albert Tell i Puig, Alessandro Bonavoglia, Jean-Baptiste Marq, Rémy Visentin, Nicolas Dos Santos Pacheco, Bohumil Maco, Ricardo Mondragón-Flores, Oscar Vadas, Dominique Soldati-Favre

PLOS Biology: published November 24, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003506

A novel targeting domain directs essential components of the cytosolic iron–sulfur cluster assembly pathway to the mitochondrion of Toxoplasma parasites

Evie R. Hodgson, Jenni A. Hayward, Rachel A. Leonard, Fadzai Victor Makota, Giel G. van Dooren

PLOS Biology: published November 25, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003520

Structural characterization of the YbbAP-TesA ABC transporter identifies it as a lipid hydrolase complex that extracts hydrophobic compounds from the bacterial inner membrane

Martin B. L. McAndrew, Jonathan Cook, Amy Gill, Kavya Sahoo, Clare Thomas, Phillip J. Stansfeld, Allister Crow

PLOS Biology: published November 25, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003427

Development of bitopic nanobody-ligand conjugates targeting G protein-coupled receptors and exhibiting logic-gated signaling

Shivani Sachdev, Swarnali Roy, Ross W. Cheloha

PLOS Biology: published November 20, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003424

Short Reports

Functional and evolutionary synergy of trait components can explain the existence of leaf masquerade in katydids

J. Benito Wainwright, Charlotte E. J. Rolfe, Graeme D. Ruxton, Nathan W. Bailey

PLOS Biology: published November 3, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003468

Genetic mapping in the red mason bee implicates ANTSR as an ancient sex-determining locus in bees and ants

Tilman Rönneburg, Demetris Taliadoros, Anna Olsson, Sara Magnusson, Linn Huser, Muhammad Nafiz Ikhwan Bin Nor Fuad, Turid Everitt, Giselle C. Martín-Hernández, Panagiotis Theodorou, Björn Cederberg, Robert J. Paxton, Karsten Seidelmann, Matthew T. Webster

PLOS Biology: published November 3, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003458

Oxygen supersaturation has negligible effects on warming tolerance across diverse aquatic ectotherms

Graham D. Raby, Jeremy De Bonville, Leroy Reynolds, Zoe Storm, Zara-Louise Cowan, Moa Metz, Anna H. Andreassen, Leon Pfeufer, Emily R. Lechner, Erin M. C. Stewart, Robine H. J. Leeuwis, Rasmus Ern, Lorena Silva-Garay, Michael R. Skeeles, Dominique G. Roche, Rachael Morgan, Leon Green, Ben Speers-Roesch, Suzanne C. Mills, Timothy D. Clark, Fredrik Jutfelt

PLOS Biology: published November 4, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003413

Zebrafish fast muscle contractions avoid the mammalian requirement for voltage-gated Na⁺ channels

Léa Demesmay, Romane Idoux, Christine Berthier, Claire Bernat, Léon Espinosa, Vincent Jacquemond, Frédéric Brunet, Angel Maunier-Mercier, Philippe Lory, Sophie Nicole, Bruno Allard

PLOS Biology: published November 4, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003484

The efficacy of longevity interventions in Caenorhabditis elegans is determined by the early life activity of RNA splicing factors

Sneha Dutta, Maria Camila Perez Matos, Caroline Heintz, Ayse Sena Mutlu, Mary Piper, Meeta Mistry, Arpit Sharma, Christopher S. Morrow, Hannah Smith, Porsha Howell, Rohan Sehgal, Anne Lanjuin, Meng C. Wang, William B. Mair

PLOS Biology: published November 21, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003504

Chemical modulation of gut bacterial metabolism induces colanic acid and extends the lifespan of nematode and mammalian hosts

Guo Hu, Marzia Savini, Matthew Brandon Cooke, Xin Wei, Dinghuan Deng, Shihong M. Gao, Ruyue Alps Xia, Youchen Guan, Alice X. Wen, Xin Yu, Jin Wang, Chao Jiang, Christophe Herman, Jiefu Li, Meng C. Wang

PLOS Biology: published November 11, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3002749

The host range of generalist and specialist phages in capsule-diverse Klebsiella hosts is driven by the evolvability of receptor-binding proteins

Celia Ferriol-González, Pilar Domingo-Calap

PLOS Biology: published November 26, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003515

Methods and Resources

Efficient and reliable spike sorting from neural recordings with UMAP-based unsupervised nonlinear dimensionality reduction

Daniel Suárez-Barrera, Lucas Bayones, Norberto Encinas-Rodríguez, Sergio Parra, Viktor Monroy, Sebastián Pujalte, Bernardo Andrade-Ortega, Héctor Díaz, Manuel Alvarez, Antonio Zainos, Alessio Franci, Román Rossi-Pool

PLOS Biology: published November 24, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003527

Cell2Spatial is a computational framework that maps single cells to spatial transcriptomic spots to reconstruct tissue architecture

Huamei Li, Jingchao Liu, Guige Wang, Zhenyu Liu, Meng Cao, Lingyun Sun, Cheng Peng, Yiyao Liu, Liang Ma, Qing Xiong

PLOS Biology: published November 17, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003477

STUPPIT is a proximity labeling tool for labeling intermediary proteins that bridge two non-interacting proteins

Lin Xie, Lijuan Gao, Weihong Fu, Gangyun Wu, Hua Li, Wenxiu Ning

PLOS Biology: published November 24, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003227

Meta-Research Article

Benchmarking with synthetic communities provides a baseline for virus-host inferences from Hi-C proximity linking

Rokaiya Nurani Shatadru, Natalie E. Solonenko, Christine L. Sun, Matthew B. Sullivan

PLOS Biology: published November 20, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003510

Editorial Note

Editorial Note: Global Regulator SATB1 Recruits β-Catenin and Regulates T_H2 Differentiation in Wnt-Dependent Manner

The PLOS Biology Editors

PLOS Biology: published November 20, 2025 | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3003507

November 2025

Cover

Diverse biophysical and molecular mechanisms drive phytoplankton sinking in response to starvation

Editorial

Related Articles

Essay

Perspectives

Related Articles

Related Articles

Related Articles

Related Articles

Primers

Related Articles

Related Articles

Related Articles

Related Articles

Research Articles

Related Articles

Related Articles

Related Articles

Related Articles

Short Reports

Related Articles

Methods and Resources

Meta-Research Article

Editorial Note

Related Articles