My research interests centre on understanding the intracellular protein degradation mechanisms used by eukaryotic cells to stay healthy and respond to various stresses. These comprise autophagy and the ubiquitin-proteasome system.
Adult tissues rely on stem cells to ensure that tissue turnover is compensated for by the production of new cells. Stem cells divide to give rise to these new cells but must also give rise to themselves to maintain a stem cell population over the lifetime of the organism.
I manage the Molecular Biology Facility. The facility has two aspects, firstly it has a range of Molecular Biology equipment that people can use, and I also provide a range of Molecular Biology services, ranging from DNA preps to cloning and mutagenesis.
Dynamical Systems; Dynamics of the Human Brain; Epileptic Seizures; Computational Modelling; Data Analysis; Machine Learning.
Microbiome engineering, principles of genome rearrangement, biocomputing and biosensing
One of the most fascinating properties of the brain is its ability to process one sensory stimulus into distinct, sometimes opposite, behavioural outputs. This is the basis of learning and decision-making, and what enables animals to couple behaviour with their ever-changing needs. Our lab studies the mechanisms that provide neural circuits with this functional plasticity.
Our mission is to understand the brain - we seek to know what computations it performs and how its architecture performs them. To this end our research is focused on memory, in particular memory for places and events.
I research and teach in the areas of forensic anatomy and osteology, and the preservation of animal remains. I lead UCL's Anatomy Laboratory. I teach various programmes including Anatomy and on the MBBS. I am also Associate Editor of the Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine.
Research in my lab is organised around three main themes: i) the cellular actin cortex; ii) mechanics of cells and tissues, and iii) cell migration in confined environments.
The primary interest of my laboratory is to understand how cells make decisions about their identity during development.
In the natural world, brains are faced with a mixture of sensory cues from multiple modalities. For example, when listening to someone speak, we combine the sounds they produce with their lip movements–which is one reason that masks make conversations more difficult! How and where are these auditory and visual streams of information combined in the brain?
Programmed cell death is a physiological process through which unwanted cells are removed from organisms. During the development of the nematode C. elegans, 131 cells reproducibly die through programmed cell death, and this makes C. elegans an ideal model to study function, mechanism and regulation of programmed cell death across scales, from the organismal to the single cell level.
My research is principally concerned with the mammalian skull and how it has been shaped by evolutionary history, environment and ecology. I study the morphological variation that can be seen at both the macro (across mammals) and micro (within species) levels in both extant and extinct taxa. I am also currently Programme Lead for UCL's BSc / MSci Human Sciences and Co-Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Anatomy
Dr Cramer’s cytoskeleton research in the field of cell biology has contributed novel cell polarisation and cell motility mechanisms, which have featured multiple times in the scientific news. She now focuses on education and assessment research & scholarship to address notable differences in scores awarded to minority ethnic and white undergraduate students.
The overarching theme of the lab is mitochondrial biology, physiology and pathophysiology. A central theme has been the relationship of mitochondria with cellular calcium signalling, but much current work explores aspects of mitochodrial quality control pathways, especially in relation to neurodegenerative disease.
My research is mainly centred on the evolution of key morphological features, particularly in reptiles (although not dinosaurs) and living amphibians. Current projects include studying fossil reptile and amphibian material from UK, China and Japan; and head-first burrowing in limbless lizards (HFSP-funded). I am also Director of the Centre for Integrative Anatomy and a CDB Graduate Tutor plus human anatomy undergraduate teacher.
My current research involves applying computational and mathematical techniques to understand and engineer new biological systems. I am particularly interested in creating stable and predictable synthetic microbial communities in complex environments, such as the gastrointestinal tract.
My research is focused on the evolution of morphological diversity through time. I use geometric morphometrics, 3-D visualization and phylogenetic methods to understand how the component parts of organisms relate to one another (i.e., modularity and integration). I also study how these interactions have shaped evolvability, disparity and variation across the tree of life. In addition, I am Associate Director (EDI) of the Division of Biosciences.
Our brains are composed of two main cell-types, neurons and glia. Neurons, the electrically excitable cells that process information, have been studied intensely but glia were thought of as support cells and often ignored. Recent work has shown that glia play essential roles in instructing brain development. Their dysfunction may therefore underlie or exacerbate many brain pathologies, underscoring the need to understand their normal roles.
In my lab, we investigate the functions of motile adipocytes in wound healing using the fruit fly Drosophila as a model system.
My research focuses on the understanding of the molecular biologyof pain states. Currently, research in my lab is organised around 2 themes: 1) the role of epigenetic mechanisms and environmental influences in thedevelopment of chronic pain conditions and 2) the role of the stress regulatorFKBP51 in the maintenance of long term pain states.
My research is quite diverse, I am mainly centred on zebrafish neuroanatomy/neuroscience.
Chronic pain is a widespread debilitating condition affecting millions of people worldwide often accompanied by depression and anxiety. Although several pharmacological treatments for relieving chronic pain have been developed, they require frequent chronic administration and are often associated with severe adverse events, including overdose and addiction. The opiate epidemic in the US has been widely publicised but the situation is not much better in the UK.
My lab studies how cells interact with their environment, focusing on chemotaxis and migration.
We combine matheatical, computational and machine learning approaches with classical biology.
We work across systems: cancer cells (melanoma, pancreatic, glioblastoma), immune cells (neutrophils, macrophages, dendritic cells), protozoa (Entamoeba, trypanosomes), and Dictyostelium developing quantitative predictive models for all.
We are using C. elegans as a model system to study the function and regulation of transporter and channel proteins. In humans, mutations in these genes lead to neurodegenerative disease, whereas in nematodes we have characterized phenotypic signatures associated with defects in specific transporter proteins.
I research the evolution of head, neck & spine anatomy in apes. I want to understand more about how these structures vary over deep time in relation to different functional demands (e.g. locomotion) and also between recent and fossil specimens. Additionally, I study the variation in larynx and vocal tract anatomy in recent hominoids. I act as Associate Director for the Division of Biosciences Undergraduate Education, and maintain a large undergraduate and postgraduate taught teaching portfolio.
Morphogenesis (generation of form) is one of the most remarkable process in biology and involves the interplay of molecular and physical events that coordinate cell differentiation and cell migration. Our aim is to understand the molecular and mechanical basis of morphogenesis during embryonic development, using an interdisciplinary approach which includes cell and molecular biology, together with mechanobiology and mathematical modelling.
We are interested in the interplay between molecular signals and mechanics during multicellular morphogenesis, with a focus on vertebrate body axis formation. We use a combination of in vivo imaging, biophysical measurements, and embryology to learn how form arises during animal ontogeny.
Our group is interested in the function of the hippocampal formation and, in particular, its role in spatial behaviour and spatial memory. By studying the place cells of mutant mice with modifications of their glutamatergic NMDA channels or the intracellular signaling molecule alphaCaMKI, we are trying to understand the synaptic and molecular mechanisms through which place fields develop and are maintained in novel environments.
Our lab focuses on the role of acidic organelles, such as lysosomes, in Ca2+ signalling in both health and disease.
I teach human anatomy with a special focus on clinical and functional anatomy, with a focus on undergraduate teaching. My research interests include: musculoskeletal pain, osteoarthritis, clinical & functional anatomy, and sports, exercise & human movement. I am peer reviewer for related journals and Full Member of the Anatomical Society.
We use the power of C. elegans as an in vivo genetic model system with single-cell resolution to reveal fundamental principles of neural development, which should subsequently provide the basis for novel therapies and brain repair strategies. In particular our aims are to uncover the cellular and molecular mechanisms that regulate left-right asymmetric neurogenesis and to address the mechanisms of plasticity and direct transdifferentiation during glial-to-neuron cell fate switches.
I explores the link between animal form, function and large-scale evolutionary events, such as: environmental changes, mass extinctions and adaptive radiations. I use a combination of techniques, including: medical imaging, 3D visualization, and biomechanical modelling methods, such as finite element and musculoskeletal modelling. I am Head Tutor for the Biosciences MRes stream Integrative Anatomy, a member of the CDB Executive Committee, and Fellow of the Linnean Society.
We study the effects of developmental process including signalling between cells through secreted factors and cell-cell adhesion on the formation and function of two types of circuit found within the brain stem: those circuits involving cranial motor neurons and the auditory circuitry that integrates information from the two ears.
We study the genes and neurons that regulate sleep, using zebrafish as a model system.
Our laboratory is studying the cellular and molecular mechanisms that modulate the formation, function and maintenance of synapses in the healthy and diseased mammalian brain. Our studies on Wnt signalling demonstrated that this prominent pathway promotes the formation and function of synapses in the hippocampus, an area implicated in learning and memory. Wnts also modulate synapse stability and function in this brain area and in the striatum, which control motor function.
We are interested in elucidating the role of mechanics in the evolution, development, and function of biological systems. Our work has contributed to our understanding of the role of mechanical stability in animal morphology and motor control, and also focuses on the mechanics of morphogenesis and function in the vertebrate musculoskeletal system. Due to the interdisciplinary nature of these questions, we rely on both theoretical and experimental tools.
The research in our laboratory focuses on the processes that establish cell diversity and pattern in the early embryo. We ask the questions: how do cells in the embryo know what fates to adopt, at the right positions and at the right time? What mechanisms ensure that the correct proportions of cells are allocated to different organs?
The overarching aim of our research group is to understand how transcriptional regulation of the nuclear encoded mitochondrial proteome is converted into bioenergetic and signaling responses of the organelle in health and disease. We use quantitative biochemical, computational, imaging and metabolomic approaches to identify components of adaptive mitochondrial pathways that will represent therapeutic targets to develop novel treatment strategies.
Our aim is to understand the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying the morphogenetic processes that shape the embryo. How do cells behave collectively within the same population and communicate with different cell populations in three dimensions?
Clinical Professor of Neuromuscular Biology and Regenerative Medicine / Honorary Consultant in Paediatric Neurology
f.s.tedesco@ucl.ac.ukWe study skeletal muscle regeneration to develop of novel experimental therapies for neuromuscular disorders. We are interested in understanding how skeletal muscle (the most abundant human tissue) sustains regeneration and how this process could be improved to develop therapies for incurable diseases such as muscular dystrophies.
Understanding and enabling control in biological systems - analysis, interpretation and manipulation. We take a broad, multifactorial and interdisciplinary approach to understanding cellular functions and their control across a range of scales from molecules upwards.
Light microscopy facility manager
We want to understand how cells control their genes in order to become specialised.
How are memories encoded in the brain? What makes some memories fade and other last a lifetime? Why can we not retain our memories of early childhood? In our lab, we investigate these questions by looking at the activity of neural circuits in the hippocampus and connected brain regions during memory formation and retrieval.
Our research addresses the formation of the brain and eyes using zebrafish as a model system. One major focus is on brain asymmetry. It is likely that the nervous systems of all bilaterally symmetric animals are left-right asymmetric with respect to processing of information and control of behaviour. However, we know very little about how asymmetries arise in development, how they are encoded in circuits and what their importance is for nervous system function.
Our lab studies cell migration, how cells move from one place to another, a fundamental tissue shaping process during organismal development. An open question in the field is how migrating cells robustly arrive at the desired final target through dynamically adapting to changes in the microenvironment.
My research is about understanding molecular mechanisms of animal evolution, and I am particularly interested in the adaptive evolution of blind cavefish. I am currently using the Mexican freshwater fish, Astyanax Mexicanus, as a model system for studying micro- and macro-evolution and development. I teach undergraduate Evolution & Development and Human Anatomy, and am a CDB Graduate Tutor.