2006 IRISH SCIENTIST YEAR BOOK

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National University of Ireland, Galway
Maura Grealy and Lucy Byrnes
Fishing for a better understanding of embryo development

Developmental Biology is the study of embryo development, from the fertilized egg to the fully formed organism. It is of inherent interest to discover how cells differentiate, organs form, and body patterns are laid down. It also underlies progress in stem cell technology and regenerative medicine. Although there is no academic department of developmental biology in Ireland, various research groups keep in touch and meet twice a year through the Irish Network of Developmental Biologists� http://www.nuigalway.ie/faculties_departments/physiology/INDB_Web/Index.html


Zebrafish are small tropical fish. They are one of the leading model organisms for studying embryo development. Model organisms are used to investigate development and disease in a simpler species with the aim of applying the information to more complex species, eg, humans. In zebrafish the embryos are transparent and develop externally so that we can easily see the developing heart or nervous system.

The first cell divisions in an embryo are under the control of the maternal genome, but when the mRNA and proteins stored in the egg become limiting it starts transcribing mRNA from its own DNA. This is called zygotic genome activation. We hypothesise that the first activated genes play an important role in later organ development. We used the technique of suppression subtractive hybridization to isolate 49 genes that had increased expression following activation of the zygotic genome in zebrafish. Ten of these are novel genes. Several of these genes show specific expression patterns in the neural structures of the embryo, suggesting a function in the development of the nervous system. We cloned the full-length of another of these genes and called it nanor. We knocked-down nanor and demonstrated that it is important in heart and blood vessel development, with implications for congenital heart disease and angiogenesis.

Our research is funded by the Health Research Board, Science Foundation Ireland, Enterprise Ireland, the National Centre for Biomedical Engineering Science and the Irish Research Council for Science and Engineering Technology.

Contacts: Dr Maura Grealy,
E-mail: [email protected]

Dr Lucy Byrnes,
E-mail: [email protected]