Amy Shyer
Rockefeller University, NY·Biology·Early-career
Organs are built from repeating structures such as hair follicles, vertebrae, and gut villi. These structures form with remarkable regularity.
- Fields
Biology
Biophysics
Biomedical Engineering
- Topics
organogenesis
morphogenesis
morphogens
- Grants
- 2 known grants, through Dec 2027
What they work on
- Map where and when morphogens, developmental signals, are expressed in the forming skin follicle, and link that activity to gene expression profiles and multicellular architecture.
- Test how morphogen activity changes tissue material properties, making regions more fluid-like or solid-like, using platforms that measure the mechanics of cell collectives.
- Combine theory and experiment to test whether interacting fluid-like and solid-like tissue phases create a mechanical instability sufficient to shape the skin.
- Test whether calcium oscillations strengthen mechanical coupling between skin fibroblasts as they self-organize in extracellular matrix, using a tissue reconstitution platform.
- Trace energy flows across self-organizing fibroblast collectives to identify the metabolic pathways that power their mechanical behavior during tissue formation.
More about the research
The usual explanation is a molecular blueprint, in which genes switch on in a set pattern. Yet organs take shape at scales far larger than single molecules or cells. These projects ask how groups of cells physically organize themselves into tissue structures. The lab uses developing skin and its follicles as a model. One project studies how morphogens, signals that guide development, change the material behavior of whole tissues. The other studies how the physics, electrical signaling, and energy use of individual cells let them coordinate as a group.
Why it matters
Knowing how tissues physically shape themselves could inform future work on congenital defects, in which organs form incorrectly. It could also help researchers engineer connective tissues with specific material properties and guide regeneration of functional tissue. Understanding how mechanics, bioelectric signals, and metabolism work together may also open new avenues for drug development.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Cheng-Ming Chuong
University of Southern California, CA·Biology
Test whether skin morphogenesis is built from linked sensor–actuator modules that turn physical cues, such as adhesion forces and ECM pulling, into gene activity, using living skin and organ explants.
Michael Mak
Stony Brook University, NY·Biomedical Engineering
Develop biofabrication methods that tune the architecture of natural, unmodified collagen I across scales, from fiber networks to whole-tissue geometry, to build realistic engineered tissues and mini-organs.
Quinton Smith
University of California-Irvine, CA·Biomedical Engineering
Test how paracrine signals and mechanical cues guide early cell fate decisions, using micropatterned induced gastrulation models of human induced pluripotent stem cells confined to defined geometries.
The school
Rockefeller University: 6 labs on PI Pages, $305M a year on research, 38 research doctorates a year.
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