title: Breathe in and straighten your back: hypoxia, notch, and scoliosis.
abstract: In this issue of Cell, Sparrow et al. propose a new mechanism for sporadically occurring congenital scoliosis in which Notch signaling and hypoxia converge in the embryo on somite patterning via the segmentation clock. This interaction between hypoxia and a predisposed genetic background might underlie other birth defects with incomplete penetrance.
authors.affiliation: Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics, Pfotenhauerstr 108, 01307 Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Lola
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Bajard
authors.forename: Andrew C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Oates