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| SPEAKER |
| Prof Jeremy Brockes |
| FRS, MRC Non-clinical Research Professor, |
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Dept of Structural & Molecular Biology, UCL
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MEETING
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June 2009 |
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| BIOGRAPHY |
Professor Brockes received his PhD at Edinburgh University in molecular biology. After post-doctoral periods in the Department of Neurobiology at Harvard (with Zach Hall), and the Department of Zoology at UCL (with Martin Raff), he joined the Division of Biology at Caltech in 1978. He returned to the UK to the MRC Biophysics Unit at KCL in 1983, then the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, and since 1998 the Department of Biochemistry at UCL. Professor Brockes' initial interests as an independent investigator were in cellular interactions in the mammalian peripheral nervous system, but he became interested in salamander regeneration, particularly limb regeneration, at Caltech and has worked on several different aspects, always from a basic science perspective. These include (a) the plasticity of differentiated cells in limb, lens and heart regeneration, (b) the nerve dependence of limb regeneration, and (c) the molecular basis for the positional identity of the blastemal stem cells in limb regeneration.
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| TALK |
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Limb regeneration in an adult vertebrate
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| DESCRIPTION |
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Certain species of adult salamanders are able to regenerate their limbs, jaws, ocular tissues, intestines and sections of the heart. Limb regeneration proceeds by formation of a mound of mesenchymal stem cells at the end of the stump, referred to as the limb blastema. Blastemal cells that arise after amputation at different levels show striking positional identity by regenerating just the structures distal to their level of origin (for example wrist cells give rise to a hand). The division of these cells at any level depends strictly on the proximity of regenerating nerve axons, and in this talk Professor Brockes will describe how new insights into this aspect of regeneration have come from studying the molecular basis of positional identity. Why do salamanders regenerate their limbs and why are mammals unable to do so? He will outline how their studies provide a new perspective on regeneration as an evolutionary variable.
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