Regulation of stem cell function during tissue homeostasis and transformation

Julia is a developmental biologist and geneticist who combines work on the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster and mammalian model systems to understand the regulation of stem cells during tissue homeostasis and transformation. Using the adult Drosophila midgut, Julia wants to understand how cell-autonomous and niche-derived signals integrate to regulate stem cell proliferation in response to damage, as well as during tumorigenesis of adult self-renewing epithelia. By translating results from the fly into suitable mammalian paradigms, Julia aims to identify conserved mechanisms involved in the regulation of tissue homeostasis, which will be of broad benefit to our understanding of human health and disease.