Developmental Biology

Iva Greenwald’s lab uses the nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans, to study how cells communicate with each other to specify fate determination during development and Richard Mann’s lab studies how homeodomain-c ontaining transcription factors control developmental pathways in the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. Richard Axel’s lab is dissecting the development of the mammalian olfactory neurons, in particular characterizing the role of the odorant receptor proteins and deciphering the specificity of neuronal connectivity. Thomas Jessell’s lab studies the development of the vertebrate spinal cord and has identified key molecular events that confer identity to cells. Finally, mouse gene knock-out technology is being used by Steve Goff’s lab to provide insights into the roles of various signal transduction molecules in vertebrate development.

Richard Axel Steve Goff Iva Greenwald

Thomas Jessell Richard Mann

Two SEM photos of a wild type head (left) and an Antp head (right) with an antenna to leg transformation. The background is an antennal imaginal disc stained for Antp (green) and Homothorax (blue). See Casares and Mann (1998) Nature 392, 723-726.

A pair of eye/antennal imaginal discs stained for Exd (blue) and Distal-less (red) (overlap looks purple). See Casares and Mann (1998) Nature 392, 723-726.

The leg imaginal disc stained for Extradenticle protein (green) and Homothorax protein (fuscia). Extradenticle is only in the nucleus in the cells that also have Homothorax, elsewhere it is in the cytoplasm. See Rieckhof et al (1997) Cell 91, 171-183.

LIN-12/Notch trafficking and regulation of DSL ligand activity during vulval induction in Caenorhabditis elegans. Development. 2005 Nov;132(22):5081-92. Greenwald Laboratory.