Changing fates on the road to neuronal diversity

One of the longstanding goals of neurobiologists is to describe, in molecular terms, how a neural progenitor cell (NPC) can generate an ordered series of uniquely fated neurons and glia. Recent studies reveal that many, or all, neural-subtype identities can be linked to sequentially changing regulatory programs within NPCs. Two new studies, in this issue of Developmental Cell, provide novel insights into the molecular details of how Drosophila NPCs transition from one offspring identity program to the next.