Research Group DESCHAMPS

Hubrecht Institute for Developmental Biology and Stem Cell Research
Contact: Dr. Jacqueline Deschamps
E-mail: j.deschamps@hubrecht.eu
Website: http://www.hubrecht.eu/research/deschamps/index.html

General research focus: Genetics of morphogenesis during axial elongation in the mouse embryo

We study the genetic basis of mouse development. We focus on embryonic morphogenesis, which in all vertebrates occurs progressively from anterior to posterior.  Tissues posterior to the head region are generated from the caudal end of the growing embryo, a zone called the “posterior growth zone”. This zone contains stem cells that self renew and also contribute descendants to mesoderm and neurectoderm along the extending axis. Defects in these stem cells and their niche give rise to precocious arrest of axial elongation in mice and to specific congenital malformations in humans.

Maintenance of the progenitors depends on transcription factor - encoding genes such as Hox, ParaHox and T box genes, and on signaling molecules such as Wnt, Fgf and retinoic acid. We aim at establishing the hierarchical genetic network driving axial growth and differentiation, which seems to have been conserved during evolution. We want to understand the biology of the posterior stem cells, define their growth requirements and their differentiation choices during embryogenesis, and the mechanism of their exhaustion when axial growth is terminated. 

Given the similarities between the abnormal termination of embryonic growth in certain human congenital disorders and in our mouse mutants, and given the fact that human ES cells resemble postimplantation epiblast in their developmental potential and undifferentiated state, we eventually wish to study in human ES cells the role of factors discovered in mouse epiblast to regulate maintenance versus exit from the multipotent state. This is in collaboration with C. Mummery (LUMC).

Our mouse studies make use of in vivo genetic approaches (generation of gain and loss of function mice), embryonic tissue grafting and whole embryo culture, in vitro culture of embryonic explants, and molecular biological techniques such as transcriptome analysis, and quantitative transcription and reporter assays.

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