{"id":17471,"date":"2019-10-22T09:00:48","date_gmt":"2019-10-22T07:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.embl.de\/?p=17471"},"modified":"2024-03-22T13:38:18","modified_gmt":"2024-03-22T12:38:18","slug":"potw1943","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/picture-of-the-week\/potw1943\/","title":{"rendered":"A perfect model"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Is it a fungus or a strange plant? Actually it\u2019s the larval form of <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Platynereis<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u2013 a group of marine ringed worms. Scientists have been using them in their studies for the past 70 years, and they are among the preferred lab organisms. They are easy to keep in the lab, and under temperature and light conditions emulating a never-ending summer, scientists can breed them at any time.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The worms generate thousands of synchronised developing larvae. This is convenient for genome-wide studies and the generation of gene expression atlases. They have also kept many ancestral features, which makes them ideal for evolutionary comparisons.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In addition, <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Platynereis<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> are <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">transparent, making them a perfect imaging model. This particular <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">individual <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">was not only modelling for science but also for the camera. The image shows the trunk of the worm, with blue colours showing nuclei, red showing axonal projections and light-green showing nuclear protein. The green hair-like structures are called chaetae and are auto-fluorescent. The worms use them for locomotion.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"vf-figure wp-block-image size-full\"><a href=\"https:\/\/news.embl.de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/potw1943_fullres.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1920\" height=\"2088\" class=\"vf-figure__image\" src=\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/potw1943_fullres.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-17470\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/potw1943_fullres.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/potw1943_fullres-276x300.jpg 276w, https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/potw1943_fullres-768x835.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/potw1943_fullres-942x1024.jpg 942w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"vf-figure__caption\">The image was taken with a confocal microscope (Leica SP8).<br \/>Credit: Paola Bertucci\/EMBL<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have a stunning picture of your science, your lab or your site, you can submit it&nbsp;<a href=\"mailto:mathias.jaeger@embl.de\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Is it a fungus or a strange plant? Actually it\u2019s the larval form of Platynereis \u2013 a group of marine ringed worms. Scientists have been using them in their studies for the past 70 years, and they are among the preferred lab organisms. They are easy to keep in the lab, and under temperature and&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":71,"featured_media":17473,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,17591],"tags":[936,820,935,934,11022],"embl_taxonomy":[],"class_list":["post-17471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-picture-of-the-week","category-science-technology","tag-larvae","tag-picture-of-the-week","tag-platynereis","tag-ringed-worm","tag-spotlight"],"acf":{"article_intro":"","related_links":false,"article_sources":false,"vf_locked":false,"featured":false,"color":"#007B53","show_featured_image":false,"field_target_display":"embl","field_article_language":{"value":"english","label":"English"},"source_article":false,"in_this_article":false,"press_contact":"None","article_translations":false,"languages":""},"embl_taxonomy_terms":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>A perfect model | EMBL<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/picture-of-the-week\/potw1943\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A perfect model | EMBL\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Is it a fungus or a strange plant? Actually it\u2019s the larval form of Platynereis \u2013 a group of marine ringed worms. Scientists have been using them in their studies for the past 70 years, and they are among the preferred lab organisms. They are easy to keep in the lab, and under temperature and&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/picture-of-the-week\/potw1943\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"EMBL\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/embl.org\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-10-22T07:00:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-03-22T12:38:18+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/potw1943_preview.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"620\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"425\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mathias J\u00e4ger\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@embl\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@embl\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Mathias J\u00e4ger\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"NewsArticle\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/picture-of-the-week\/potw1943\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/picture-of-the-week\/potw1943\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Mathias J\u00e4ger\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/63a0ca26daa6707834de41dfddfc6a42\"},\"headline\":\"A perfect model\",\"datePublished\":\"2019-10-22T07:00:48+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-03-22T12:38:18+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/picture-of-the-week\/potw1943\/\"},\"wordCount\":202,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/picture-of-the-week\/potw1943\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/potw1943_preview.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"larvae\",\"picture of the week\",\"platynereis\",\"ringed worm\",\"spotlight\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Picture of the week\",\"Science &amp; 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