NSF PRFB FY 2023: Development across evolutionary time at a single-cell resolution

This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2023, Integrative Research Investigating the Rules of Life Governing Interactions Between Genomes, Environment, and Phenotypes. The fellowship supports research and training of the fellow that will contribute to the area of Rules of Life in innovative ways. Development from a single-celled egg to an adult animal relies on the coordination and control of thousands of genes that allows them to be turned on and off in the right cell at the right time. How the regulation of these genes changes between organisms through evolution, and results in Earth’s diversity of life remains a fundamental and unanswered question of biology. Comparisons of the gene regulation that controls development between closely related animals reveals that despite superficial similarity, how development is controlled can vary significantly. This project aims to provide insight into the extent by which gene regulation differs across 13 species of closely related and similar roundworms in order to reveal what allows some genes to change and others to stay the same. Overall, the project will use these roundworms as a model system to expand our knowledge of how development evolves across animals more broadly. The fellow will use single-cell sequencing to measure the spatiotemporal divergence of gene expression across evolutionary time within the Caenorhabditis nematodes by comparing the transcriptomes of homologous cells and tissues between species across embryonic development. Taking a systems approach, the fellow will help elucidate the constraints on gene regulatory network evolution by building and comparing molecular atlases of development for 13 Caenorhabditis species. The multispecies single-cell atlases will allow for the determination of the rate of divergence of cell and gene expression patterns across the Caenorhabditis genus to test fundamental models in evolution and development. Additionally, using the data and knowledge gained through this project, the fellow will help train the next generation of scientists through a series of computational biology training workshops for summer undergraduate researchers from underrepresented backgrounds. The fellow will also directly train a diverse group of summer undergraduate researchers in the laboratory. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.