The faculty participating in Washington University's Developmental Biology Program are a diverse scientific community with a wide range of research interests; most of which center around the topics of cell fate determination, gene expression, growth control and morphogenesis, neural development, signal transduction and evolution. Highlighted below are a sampling of faculty representatives from each area of interest. As you read through the list, simply click on the circles to the left of each faculty description for more pictures and information. For a complete list of all faculty who take part in the Program, please also explore the alphabetical faculty listing on this website.

Ross L. Cagan, Ph.D. "The developing Drosophila retina has proven enormously useful in addressing the basic questions of cell fate choice and patterning within a neuroepithelium. Perhaps its greatest virtue is its simplicity: the fly retina represents a simple micro nervous system composed of only twenty cell types."

Raphael Kopan, Ph.D. "One focus of my lab is to understand the molecular basis of cell fate slelection in the hair follicle and the role of the Notch pathway in this process.

Kerry Kornfeld, M.D., Ph.D. "A simple and extensively characterized cellular anatomy C. elegans has a small number of cells and is essentially transparent, so individual cells can be visualized in living worms and readily identified. By simply observing live animals, it was possible..."

Kristen Kroll, Ph.D. "Research in our lab focuses on the molecular circuitry underlying the formation of the neural plate. We have identified genes involved in neurogenesis by expression screening: small pools of cDNAs are expressed in embryos of the amphibian Xenopus laevis."

Tim Schedl, Ph.D. "Tumorous germline phenotype caused by a mutation that activates the C. elegans Notch receptor GLP-1. The Figure is a fluorescence micrograph of a dissected gonad from an adult glp-1(oz112gf) hermaphrodite stained with the dye DAPI (in blue) to visualize nuclear DNA morphology."

Sarah C.R. Elgin, Ph.D. "We are interested in the role that chromatin structure plays in gene regulation, considering both effects from packaging large domains and local effects of the nucleosome array. We work with Drosophila, combining biochemical, genetic and cytological approaches."

David B. Wilson, M.D., Ph.D. "In situ hybridization of GATA-4 mRNA in mouse embryos. Corresponding bright field (A-C) and dark field (D-F) views of 6 day p.c. (A,D) and 7 day (B,C,E,F) embryos are shown. GATA-4 mRNA is abundantly expressed in the visceral endoderm and nascent mesoderm of the embryos. "

Marc R. Hammerman, M.D. "Developed metanephric kidney (m) 12 weeks after transplantation of a renal anlage from a rat embryo into the peritoneum of an adult rat host."

Steven L. Johnson, Ph.D. "We use zebrafish pigment pattern and regenerating fins to discover how cells are recruited to reenter developmental pathways."

Raphael Kopan, Ph.D. "We are using mice to studying the role of Notch in organogenesis."

Aaron DiAntonio, M.D., Ph.D. "Synaptic strengths change as neuronal circuits develop and are modified by experience. The primary interest in our laboratory is the regulation of synaptic strength during development. In particular, we focus on the role of postsynaptic activity in the regulation of..."

Kristen Kroll, Ph.D. "cDNAs that cause overproduction of neural tissue at the expense of adjacent epidermis are detected and individual genes of interest are cloned. Current efforts focus on (1) studying how these proteins act coordinately to establish a neural fate and (2) determining how the dynamic..."

David M. Ornitz, M.D., Ph.D. "We are studying how FGF8 and FGF17 cooperate to control the growth and differentiation of the cerebellar primordium ... also, the regulation of neuronal signaling in the adult central nervous system by the cytoplasmic form of FGF14..."

Yi Rao, Ph.D. "We are interested in signaling mechanisms underlying vertebrate development. One of our focuses is on molecular guidance of axon projection and neuronal migration. We have discovered that a secreted protein..."

Kevin Roth, M.D., Ph.D. "Bcl-XL is expressed in post-miotic neurons in the developing mouse cerebrum. The E12.5 telecephalon of a wild-type embryo was subjected to triple labeling of (a) MAP2, (b) Bcl-XL, and (c) bisbenzimide. When the three fluorescence channels were overlapped..."

Paul Taghert, Ph.D. "The developmental interests in my laboratory concern the specification of neuronal identity. We study transcriptional and post-translational mechanisms that influence production of critical chemical messengers – neuropeptide transmitters."

Raphael Kopan, Ph.D. "My lab is dissecting the biochemical steps involved in the signal transduction by Notch.

Kerry Kornfeld, M.D., Ph.D. "During C. elegans development, the cell P6.p responds to a signal from the anchor cell using a conserved signal transduction pathway that includes a receptor tyrosine kinase, Ras, and mitogen activated protein (MAP) kinase. Since mutations that activate this pathway..."

Mark Johnston, Ph.D. "We are learning how yeast cells sense glucose and signal its presence to the gene regulatory machinery. This is one of the most important regulatory mechanisms in yeast, and the organism has evolved sophisticated mechanisms for regulating gene expression in response to glucose."

David M. Ornitz, M.D., Ph.D. "We are examining biochemical mechanisms which regulate the activity and specificity of FGF ligands toward FGF receptors."

Tim Schedl, Ph.D. "The C. elegans GLD-1 RNA binding protein acts as a translational repressor to 'mask' mRNAs synthesized through early oogenesis. When GLD-1 is degraded during late oogenesis mRNAs become 'unmasked' and translated. In the four panel fluorescence micrograph..."

Steven L. Johnson, Ph.D. "One goal of the zebrafish genome project is to explore the correspondance of zebrafish genes and maps, to human genes and maps."

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This website is maintained by Laura Kyro. Updated June 2001.