We are thrilled to announce Megan Martik will be joining the MCB Genetics, Genomics and Development division as an Assistant Professor, arriving July 2021!

Martik is currently a postdoc in Dr. Marianne Bronner’s lab at the California Institute of Technology, where she has unraveled a gene regulatory network controlling the development of neural crest-derived cardiomyocytes and has found that these cells are required for adult heart repair in zebrafish. She’s also uncovered a gene circuit that has evolved progressively throughout vertebrate evolution to give rise to novel neural crest-derived cell types. Her research group will combine state of the art developmental biology techniques with systems-level approaches, such as single-cell transcriptomics and epigenomic analysis, to characterize gene networks controlling neural crest differentiation during development and neural crest contributions to adult regeneration in a variety of model organisms. 

To learn more, follow Dr. Martik on Twitter @MeganMartikPhD