Mechanisms of epithelial morphogenesis in drosophila

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The aim of my research program is to understand how structures with different form and function arise as an organism develops. For example, an initially uniform sheet of cells, or epithelium, can take on a complex form as its individual cells change their shapes or undergo various movements. We use the ovary of the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, as a simple experimental system for understanding what molecules inside the cell carry out these cellular behaviors. The follicular epithelium of the ovary, which surrounds each developing egg, starts out as a uniform sheet but, over time, two groups of cells in the tissue undergo a series of shape changes, creating folds in the tissue that go on to form two tubes of cells that project from the flat sheet.