Dr. James Briscoe
Senior Group Leader, Developmental Dynamics Laboratory, The Francis Crick Institute

Title: “About Time: The Dynamics of Neural Tube Development”

Biography: James Briscoe is a senior group leader at The Francis Crick Institute. He obtained a B.Sc. in Microbiology and Virology from the University of Warwick, UK. Following a PhD in Ian Kerr’s laboratory at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, London (now part of The Francis Crick Institute), he undertook postdoctoral training at Columbia University, New York, USA, with Thomas Jessell first as a Human Frontiers Science Program Fellow then as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellow.

In 2000 he moved to the MRC-National Institute for Medical Research (now part of The Francis Crick Institute) to establish his own research group and in 2001 he was elected an EMBO Young Investigator. He was awarded the EMBO Gold Medal in 2008 and elected to EMBO in 2009. In 2012 he was appointed Head of Division in Developmental Biology. In 2018 he became Editor in Chief of Development, a journal published by the Company of Biologists, a not-for-profit scientific publisher. He was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences and a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2019.

His research interests include the molecular and cellular mechanisms of graded signalling by morphogens and the specification of cell fate in the vertebrate neural tube. To address these questions his lab uses a range of experimental and computational techniques and model systems that include mouse and chick embryos and embryonic stem cells.

Abstract: The embryonic development of the vertebrate neural tube is a dynamic process coordinated by intercellular signalling that directs a gene regulatory network to assign cell fate. At the same time tissue growth and differentiation alters the arrangement and number of cells, contributing to the elaboration of pattern. Together these mechanisms determine the pattern, pace, precision and proportion of the forming neural tube. Thus, accurate development of the neural tube and the specification of neuronal subtype identity relies on the interplay of cellular and molecular processes.