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 | Ivor Mason
MRC Centre for Developmental Neurobiology, King's College London, London, United Kingdom | | | Faculty Member: Developmental Biology > Developmental Molecular Mechanisms [ since 2 December 2005 ] |
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Ivor Mason is Professor of Developmental Biology and Assistant Director of the Medical Research Council Centre for Developmental Neurobiology at King's College London. He gained his first degree in zoology at the University of Oxford and a PhD at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund in the laboratory of Brigid Hogan, where he studied the first differentiation events during mouse embryogenesis. In 1986, he took a postdoctoral position with Martin Raff and Anne Mudge at University College London where his interest in developmental neurobiology was first fuelled. He was appointed to a lectureship in molecular embryology in the Division of Anatomy at Guy's Hospital Medical School, London in 1990 and subsequently has remained on the Guy's Hospital Campus, although the Medical School has now merged with that of King's College London. From that time his work has focussed upon the role of local signalling events in subdividing and giving regional identity to the developing brain. He has been co-director, with Prof. Andrew Lumsden FRS, of the Medical Research Council's Brain Development Programme since 1992. In 1998 he was elected Honorary Secretary of the British Society for Developmental Biology, serving in that capacity for the following 5 years, and was awarded a Personal Chair in Developmental Biology by the University of London in 2000. In 2001 he was made a Fellow of the Institute of Biology and was Cornelius Wiersma Visiting Professor at Caltech in 2003.
Research Interests
The vertebrate embryo is sculpted largely through a process of persuasion rather than cell autonomy, where the persuasive forces take the form of intercellular signals. The Mason group seeks to identify these instructive cues and understand the mechanisms by which they direct cellular behaviours. We focus primarily upon how signalling processes direct development of the brain; how they are deployed to impart regional identity, cell fate, control proliferation and to direct morphogenetic movements and guide axons to their targets. Our recent work has established that the same signal from the same source may serve to instruct several of these processes either simultaneously or sequentially. Moreover, we have found that the same signalling centre may serve to direct the development of tissues adjacent to the brain, thereby coordinating head development both spatially and temporally. We make use of three vertebrate model organisms in our work, zebrafish, chick and mouse, according to which is best-suited to address any particular question and we also utilise organ, explant and tissue culture approaches. Some ongoing projects are introduced below and further details can be found on the web page for our group.
Failure of neural tube closure (neurulation) is a major source of human birth defects, the most severe form being craniorachyschisis, in which closure fails to initiate in the midbrain resulting in a complete failure of brain closure. We are studying a transmembrane receptor called Flamingo which, when defective, results in craniorachyschisis in mammals and defective neurulation in zebrafish. Nothing is known about how Flamingo signals within the cell, how it is activated and in which cells it is required during neurulation. We are currently seeking to address all of these problems.
During and immediately after neurulation, local signaling imparts regional identity to the brain. We have examined this in detail in the context of Fgf8, which signals from the boundary between midbrain and anterior hindbrain (the isthmus) to specify and pattern those two structures. We also established the generality of this mechanism, identifying similar Fgf-producing signalling centres in both forebrain and hindbrain. Current work focuses on understanding the intracellular signalling pathways and their feedback inhibitors that mediate Fgf function particularly at the isthmus. We are also examining how cell fate and neural progenitor proliferation are regulated in these regions. Such studies have led us to investigate how the multiple signals that impinge on neural progenitors are integrated within the cell. We are studying this problem in the context of Fgf, Wnt, BMP/GDF and Shh signals.
We showed recently how Fgf8 continues to be expressed at the isthmus at later stages, where it serves to provide a guidance cue for the navigation of nearby axons. We are now studying the generality of Fgfs as chemotropic agents for axons in the brain and also in the olfactory system, in which defects in an FGF receptor underlie some cases of human Kallmann¿s syndrome. | Home page
http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/biomedical/mrc/ResearchGroup.php?GroupID=20 |
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