Can we spot scientific breakthroughs before they happen?
How do funding decisions shape the direction of biomedical research? Can we spot transformative discoveries years before they are recognised by prizes, policies, or the wider community? And what can patterns of scientific communication tell us about how breakthroughs actually emerge? In a new spotLights episode, preLighter Jonathan Townson speaks…
| Posted on | 15 April 2026 |
New ‘spotLights’ Short: Anubhav takes the stage
After launching our very first YouTube Short with Teodora Piskova two weeks ago, we’re back with another video highlighting excellent (preprinted) work from within the preLights community. This time, in Episode 18 of spotLights, we hear from Anubhav Prakash, a postdoctoral researcher in the Wickström lab at the Max Planck…
| Posted on | 18 March 2026 |
Gauri Gharpure on hoverflies in the Himalayas – spotLights episode 15 is now live
In episode 15, recorded at the Biologists @ 100 conference in Liverpool, preLighter Jonathan Townson talks to Gauri Gharpure, a PhD student at the National Centre for Biological Sciences, TIFR, Bengaluru, India. Gauri shares insights from her recent preprint on how the hoverfly Eristalis tenax adapts to life at different…
| Posted on | 13 June 2025 |
spotLights episode 14 highlights preprinted work from the Allegretti Lab
In Episode 14, recorded live at the Biologists @ 100 conference in Liverpool, we chat with Matteo Allegretti, a group leader at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, UK. Matteo shares insights into his lab's cutting-edge work on nuclear remodelling during cell differentiation and, more specifically, during spermatogenesis.…
| Posted on | 9 June 2025 |
spotLights episode 13 features experimental biophysicist Giulia Paci
In this episode of spotLights, we speak with Giulia Paci, an EMBO Postdoctoral Fellow working in the Tissue Mechanics Lab led by Prof Yanlan Mao. She is an experimental biophysicist with a strong interest in exploring how things like physical forces shape development and balance in living systems. Giulia is…
| Posted on | 5 June 2025 |
spotLights episode 12: Daniel Booth on the value of preprints for a young lab
In episode 12 of spotLights, we sit down with Daniel Booth to discuss a series of recent preprints from his lab (including one that was recently published in Journal of Cell Science), presented at the Biologists @ 100 conference. The work dives into the molecular mechanisms that drive both normal…
| Posted on | 29 May 2025 |