Abstract: Emergence of multicellular forms (tissues, organs and organisms) from cells through changes in their shape, size, number and organization is central to understanding the process of morphogenesis. While molecular players are known, we do not know how the activity of genes and proteins is translated into 3D structures in space and time. Pre-existing spatial cues, species-specific geometry and extraembryonic signalling centers, confound studying these processes in vivo. It has been shown that 3D cell aggregates from different species (mouse embryonic stem cells and zebrafish blastula cells, which we term gastruloids and pescoids respectively) generate spatial asymmetries in gene expression and cell behaviour within otherwise equivalent groups of cells, to develop a global coordinate system (body axes) de novo. Combining light-sheet imaging with genetic labelling of cells we are now gaining some insights into the spatio-temporal precision and species-independent manner, with which such 3D embryonic cell aggregates generate the major body axes even in the absence of any embryonic information. Using these embryonic organoids, as a minimal alternate system, sufficient to generate embryonic axes, we aim to understand early development in embryos as an emergent phenomenon of the self-organisation of pluripotent cells.

Biography

2006-2010: Bachelor of Technology (undergraduate)at Indian Institute of Technology

2010-2015: PhD at Caltech (with Dr. Scott Fraser), focused on 2-photon light sheet imaging for imaging zebrafish heart

2015-2016: Career Break

2016-2017: Short postdoc at University of Cambridge (with Dr. Alfonso Martinez Arias)

2018-now: Group Leader at EMBL Barcelona

Joint appointment: Developmental Biology Unit, EMBL Heidelberg