Through a great collaboration with Laura Reinholdt’s lab, we discovered that the mitotic kinesin, Kif18A, is required for cell division in germ cells but not somatic cells. Kif18A plays a central role in aligning chromosomes during metaphase. Interestingly, somatic cells lacking Kif18A divide without aligning their chromosomes. We’re now trying to understand why Kif18A is specifically required in the germline and how segregating chromosomes in the absence of alignment impacts genomic stability.