Coordination of patterning and growth during development

This 4-year PhD studentship is offered in Dr Jean-Paul Vincent’s Group based at the Francis Crick Institute (the Crick).

The overall aim of the project will be to uncover the molecular logic underlying the coordination between patterning and growth during development. This work will be performed with wing imaginal discs of Drosophila, which have been a model to study patterning and growth control for many years. In this system, two signaling proteins, Wingless and Dpp have been shown to organise pattern elements, such as veins and sensory bristles while at the same time being required for growth [91-95]. So far, the pro-growth activity of these signals has been largely studied at the phenomenological level. Therefore, one specific aim of this project is to determine how, mechanistically, Wingless and Dpp signalling contributes to growth and how the inputs from these two pathways is combined and coordinated with those of other pro-growth modulators. We expect that signalling by Wingless and Dpp impinges on distinct regulators of growth since these two signals are not interchangeable. For each signalling pathway, our work and that of others have identified one key candidate pro-growth mediator: Vestigial for Wingless and Brinker for Dpp. We will therefore focus on these two regulators, at least at the outset. We will first use the latest methods of genome engineering to ask whether these two mediators account for the growth promoting activity of Wingless and Dpp. If this is the case, we will then develop optogenetic tools to acutely modulate their activity and identify early immediate on growth and target genes with quantitative tools to measure growth and a combination of candidate gene analysis, transcriptomics, and other genomic approaches. The role of these target genes in growth control will then be validated/assessed with conditional alleles and other genetic tools. Ultimately, we hope that this work will explain how patterning and growth are always exquisitely coordinated thus ensuring that functional organs are generated under a variety of environmental conditions

Talented and motivated students passionate about doing research are invited to apply for this PhD position. The successful applicant will join the Crick PhD Programme in September 2019 and will register for their PhD at one of the Crick partner universities (Imperial College London, King’s College London or UCL).

Applicants should hold or expect to gain a first/upper second-class honours degree or equivalent in a relevant subject and have appropriate research experience as part of, or outside of, a university degree course and/or a Masters degree in a relevant subject.

APPLICATIONS MUST BE MADE ONLINE VIA OUR WEBSITE (ACCESSIBLE VIA THE ‘APPLY NOW’ LINK ABOVE) BY 12:00 (NOON) NOVEMBER 13 2018. APPLICATIONS WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED IN ANY OTHER FORMAT.