QMB Development Speakers

Confirmed speakers

Asst. Prof. Sebastien Bouret, University of Southern California, USA
Title: TBA
Sebastien Bouret received a Ph.D. in neuroscience from the university of Lille (France) in 2001. He subsequently joined the laboratory of Dr. Richard Simerly in the Department of Neuroscience at the Oregon Health and Science University where he did his postdoctoral work. In 2004, Dr. Bouret was appointed Research Associate at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), and visiting Faculty in the Neuroscience Program of The Saban Research Institute at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. He was then promoted to visiting Assistant Professor at the University of Southern California in 2007. Dr. Bouret’s research interest is to study the development of brain circuits regulating food intake and body weight. He is also interested in studying the influence of perinatal factors, such as hormones and nutrition, in the development of these critical pathways. He has published many articles, reviews, and book chapters in the field of developmental programming and has been invited to lecture internationally.

Prof. Susan Brown. Kansas State University, USA
Title: TBA
Sue is a member of the Division of biology at Kansas State University. She works in insect evolution and development focusing particularly on early patterning in the Beetle, Tribolium casteneum. Sue was a key part of the Tribolium genome sequencing project and is involved in genomics and bioinformatic studies in this and other insects. Sue's attendance at QMB is sponsored by Genetics Otago please).

Prof. Anne Calof, University of California, Irvine, USA
Tttle: TBA

Asst. Prof. Cassandra Extavour, Harvard University, USA
Title: Approaches to understanding the evolution of novelty in germ line specification.
Cassandra is a member of the Department of Organistic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University. She works on the evolution and development of germ cells in a vast range of animals.

Assoc. Prof. Alan Davidson, University of Auckland, New Zealand
Title: Renal Regeneration in Zebrafish
Alan obtained his Ph.D from the University of Auckland in 1999.  He undertook his post-doctoral research at Children’s Hospital, Boston where he studied the formation of haematopoietic stem cells in zebrafish.  In 2005 his started his own research programme at Massachusetts General Hospital in the Centre for Regenerative Medicine, focusing on kidney regeneration in zebrafish.  Dr Davidson was awarded the Rutherford Distinguished fellowship from the Rutherford Foundation allowing him to return to New Zealand in 2011.  He is currently continuing his studies of kidney development and repair in zebrafish at the University of Auckland.

Prof. Robert Ho, University of Chicago, USA
Title: Cdx factors specify the vertebrate spinal cord by repression of the segmented, hindbrain developmental program.
Robert is from the Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy at the University of Chicago, where he works on the development of vertebrate embryos using zebrafish as a model system, particularly focusing on axis formation and cell fate decisions.

Prof. Arthur Lander, University of California, Irvine, USA
Title:TBA Arthur is Professor of Developmental and Cell Biology and Biomedical Engineering at the University of California, Irvine, and Director of the Center for Complex Biological Systems, an NIGMS National Center for Systems Biology. He serves on the editorial boards of PLoS Biology and Journal of Biology, is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation, a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and a member of the Science Board of the Sante Fe Institute.

Prof. Runlin Ma, Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Title: Breeding of RCN3 knockout mice, a novel model for infant respiration failure
Prof. Ma works on Genomics of Humans and Animals, Mouse models of auto-immune diseases and gene function and evolution

Dr. Daniel Nettle, University of Newcastle, UK
Title: Dying young and living fast.
Daniel is a Reader at the Centre for Behaviour & Evolution, Newcastle University, UK He is an anthropologist and psychologist with a special interest in how evolutionary theory can illuminate contemporary human behaviour and cognition. His research interests include reproductive success and sexual ection in contemporary human populations and parental and grand-parental investment in humans.

Prof. Victoria Prince, University of Chicago, USA
Title: Zebrafish facial neuron migration requires a nuclear function of Prickle1b
Vicky studies axial and hindbrain patterning in the Zebrafish using molecular, cellular and genetic techniques in the Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy at the University of Chicago.

Assoc. Prof. Rebecca Simmons, University of Pennsylvania, USA
Title: Epigenetic landscape of the Beta Cell: Hills and Dales
Rebecca Simmons is an Associate Professor in Pediatrics, at the School of Medicine, University Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, USA. Her primary research interest lies in the investigation of the underlying molecular mechanisms that link an aberrant intrauterine milieu to the later development of obesity and type 2 diabetes in adulthood. She has expertise in the Developmental Origins of Adult Disease and is internationally known for her work on the epigenetic regulation of ß-cell function and development. She has a keen interest in the effects of obesity during pregnancy and the long-term outcome in the offspring. Her work centres around the understanding of windows of susceptibility of the developing organism to the effects of obesity during gestation, and of epigenetic regulation of gene expression. Rebecca has recently won the Boyd Orr Award, from the Royal Nutrition Society, in Edinburgh, Scotland.

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