"All Cells Come from Cells"∗.

Abstract

What an exciting time for cell and developmental biologists! While cell biology and developmental biology share a distant common ancestry, over the years these two disciplines have grown apart—scientists train as either cell or developmental biologists; universities designate independent departments. However, we are increasingly reminded that these two fields are fundamentally interconnected. We cannot understand the development of a whole organism without understanding how the individual cells that compose it are specified and organized, how these cells proliferate, migrate, communicate, and interact with each other. Reciprocally, we cannot fully understand the functional implications of cell polarity or asymmetric cell division without understanding tissue morphogenesis or organ development. As the new Editor-in-Chief of Developmental Cell, I questioned how the journal could arouse these two communities to move closer together. While cell and developmental biologists might be using different experimental approaches, they address the same fundamental question, which is to understand how cells work to ultimately build a whole organism. Going forward, while we will continue to serve the developmental biology community, we will give emphasis to papers featuring new insights into the structure and function of cells whether they are studied as single entities or within a whole organism. Because technological advances have always driven our understanding of how cells work individually and together, Developmental Cell will also give emphasis to papers featuring original and innovative methods that will transform the way cell and developmental biologists approach their disciplines. In bringing cell and developmental biology together under one roof, we envision that both communities will synergize and inspire each other by exchanging knowledges, concepts, and methods that will lead to a better understanding of how cells work in its broadest sense. Technology is also connecting cell and developmental biology with other fields—understanding cellular aging goes hand in hand with understanding cellular metabolism; epigenetic principles govern germ cell specification; biophysics lends a hand to study cancer cell biology. Going forward, I want Developmental Cell to embrace the breadth of cell biology and be a prime choice for cell biologists eager to connect the field to other disciplines. We are already diving into it as we prepare our Special Issue for 2020, which will focus on how cell and developmental biology intertwine with the field of cellular metabolism. Besides our commitment to publishing the most impactful and innovative work in cell and developmental biology, we are committed to providing the best service to our authors. My talented editorial team—comprised of Ilil Carmi, Masha Gelfand, and Spyros Goulas—and myself are committed to offering you a timely, rigorous, constructive, and fair peer-review process. We are committed to being decisive in our decisions and being your best advocate in publishing your research. We are committed to being accessible and to listening to your feedback. Reinforcing our engagement toward the scientific communities we already serve and building trustworthy relationships with the communities we want to serve better is important to us. This month, I will be traveling to Washington, D.C. to attend the 2019 American Society of Cell Biology meeting. The meeting embodies the breadth of cell biology—from cell fate to cell migration in cancer, from lipid trafficking to phase separation. As we strive to broaden the scope of Developmental Cell, I am looking forward to engaging with current and future generations of cell biologists to discuss how to work together to better serve their community and fulfill the vision I have for the journal. ∗omnis cellula e cellula (all cells [come] from cells), from François-Vincent Raspail and later attributed to Rudolf Karl Virchow.