Marianne Bronner

Marianne Bronner is the Edward B. Lewis Professor of Biology and Director of the Beckman Institute at the California Institute of Technology. She is affiliated with the Biology department. Her research focuses on cellular and developmental biology, evolutionary and organismal biology, and neuroscience. Her work explores the signaling and transcriptional interactions involved in neural crest development, including the molecular mechanisms underlying neural crest formation, placode specification, and the evolution of these structures. She also investigates the role of epigenetic modifications in neural crest development and the migratory behavior of neural crest cells. Additionally, she examines the connection between neural crest biology and cancer, particularly the invasive properties of neural crest derivatives.

Marianne E. Bronner is a developmental biologist and evolutionary biologist whose research focuses on the mechanisms underlying neural crest formation, migration, and differentiation. Her work explores gene regulatory networks, cell lineage analysis, and the role of signaling pathways such as Wnt and Eph-related receptors in neural crest development. Bronner's studies also examine the evolutionary origins of vertebrate traits through comparative developmental biology, including the analysis of amphioxus and sea lamprey genomes. Her research bridges developmental and evolutionary processes, shedding light on the genetic and cellular basis of cranial placode formation and the evolution of vertebrate structures.