From EMBL

will give a seminar entitled :

Self-organisation in mouse development

A defining feature of living systems is the capacity to break symmetry and generate well-defined forms and patterns through self-organisation. Our group aims to understand the principle of multi-cellular self-organisation using early mouse embryos as a model system. Mammalian eggs lack polarity and symmetry is broken during early embryogenesis. This results in the formation of a blastocyst consisting of three cell types, each distinct in its position and gene expression. Our studies revealed that morphogenesis and gene expression are highly dynamic and stochastically variable during this process. Determining which signal breaks the symmetry and how the blastocyst establishes a reproducible shape and pattern despite the preceding variability remains fundamental open questions. We have recently developed an experimental framework that integrates biology, physics and mathematics to address these questions. We study how molecular, cellular and physical signals are dynamically coupled across the spatial and temporal scales for self-organisation during early mammalian development.