Chercheurs

Sciences de la Vie / GURDON, JOHN B.

Position

Distinguished Group Leader in the Wellcome Trust/CRUK Gurdon Institute in Cambridge, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom.

He received his Doctorate from the University of Oxford in 1960 and was a postdoctoral fellow at California Institute of Technology. He joined Cambridge University, UK, in 1972 and has served as Professor of Cell Biology and Master of Magdalene College.

Thèmes de recherche

We are trying to find ways of obtaining embryo cells from the cells of an adult. The eventual aim is to provide replacement cells of all kinds starting from usually obtainable cells of an adult individual. For example, we would like to be able to find a way of obtaining spare heart or brain cells from skin or blood cells. The important point is that the replacement cells need to be from the same individual, to avoid problems of rejection and hence of the need for immunosuppression. We are trying to identify the molecules and mechanisms by which eggs can reverse the process of specialization, so as to derive embryo cells from adult skin cells.

Prix et récompenses

Sir John B Gurdon has won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2012, jointly with Shinya Yamanaka, for his discovery that the specialisation of cells is reversible, challenging the dogma that mature cells are irreversibly committed to their fate.

Publications

Miyamoto K, Pasque V, Jullien J and Gurdon JB (2011) Nuclear actin polymerization is required for transcriptional reprogramming of Oct4 by oocytes. Genes & Development 25(9):946-958

Pasque V, Gillich A, Garrett N and Gurdon JB (2011) Histone variant macroH2A confers resistance to nuclear reprogramming. EMBO J 6;30(12):2373-87

Jullien J, Halley-Stott RP, Miyamoto K, Pasque V and Gurdon JB (2011) Mechanisms of nuclear reprogramming by eggs and oocytes: a deterministic process? Nature Reviews Molecular & Cell Biology, 12, 453-459

Narbonne P, Simpson DE and Gurdon JB (2011) Deficient induction response in a Xenopus nucleocytoplasmic hybrid. PLoS Biology 9(11):e101197

Pasque V, Jullien J, Miyamoto K, Halley-Stott RP and Gurdon JB (2011) Genetic and epigenetic factors affecting nuclear reprogramming efficiency. Trends in Genetics 27(12)516-525

Gurdon, J.B. (1962). The developmental capacity of nuclei taken from intestinal epithelium cells of feeding tadpoles. Journal of Embryology and Experimental Morphology 10:622-640.