Dr Betsy Pownall
betsy.pownall@york.ac.uk
Tel:     +44 (0)1904 328692

Pownall Lab Publications

Interested in a PhD position?
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Curriculum Vitae

BS  St Michael’s College Vermont
PhD  University of Virginia

Senior lecturer, University of York

Post-doctoral fellow, University of Bath, 1995-1999

Post-doctoral fellow, University of Oxford, 1993-1995

Pownall Lab

Research Interests

Transcriptional targets of MyoD
(Richard Maguire)
We have recently undertaken a large-scale transcriptomic analysis to identify genes regulated by MyoD in the early Xenopus embryo and have identified several candidates that are expressed in the early mesoderm hours before the expression of the first markers of skeletal muscle differentiation.

Key Publications

Pownall, ME and Isaacs HV. 2010. FGF signalling in vertebrate development. Colloquium Series on Developmental Biology, Morgan and Claypool.

Guiral, EC, Faas, L, Pownall, ME. 2010. Neural crest migration requires the activity of the extracellular sulfatases XtSulf1 and XtSulf2 Developmental Biology (in press)

Branney, PA., Faas, L,  Steane, SE, Pownall, ME and Isaacs HV. 2009 Characterisation of the fibroblast growth factor dependent transcriptome in early development. PLoS One 4(3):e4951

Winterbottom, EF and Pownall, ME.  2009. Complementary expression of HSPG 6-O-endosulfatases and 6-O-sulfotransferase in the hindbrain of Xenopus laevis Gene Exp Patterns 9:166-72

Freeman, SD, Moore,WM, Guiral, EC, Holme, A, Turnbull, JE, and Pownall, ME.  2008. Extracellular regulation of developmental cell signaling by Xtsulf1. Developmental Biology 320(2):436-45

Isaacs, HV, Deconinck, AE, Pownall, ME. 2007. FGF4 regulates blood and muscle specification in Xenopus laevis  Biology of the Cell 99(3):165-73

Grimaldi, A, Tettamanti,G,  Pownall, ME, Martin, B, Gaffield, W, and Hughes, SM. 2004. Hedgehog induction of superficial muscle fibres in Xenopus and the evolution of trunk myogenesis. Development 131: 3249-3262

Wang, S, Ai, X, Freeman, SD, Pownall, ME, Lu, Q, Kessler, DS, and Emerson, CP. 2004. QSulf1, a heparan sulfate 6-O endosulfatase, inhibits FGF-induced mesoderm formation and angiogenesis by modulating FGF ligand –receptor interaction. PNAS 101: 4833-38

Pownall, ME, Welm, BE, Freeman,KW, Spencer, DM, Rosen, JM, and Isaacs, HV. 2003.   An inducible system for the study of FGF signalling during amphibian development. Dev Biol 256: 89-99  

Fisher, ME, Peck, W, Branney, PA, and Pownall, ME.2003. Cloning and characterisation of Myf5 and MyoD homologues in Xenopus tropicalis. Biology of the Cell. 95:555-561.  

Pownall, ME, Gustafsson, MK, and Emerson, CP, Jr.2002.  Myogenic regulatory factors and the specification of muscle progenitors in vertebrate embryos. Annual Review Cell and Dev Biol 18:747-83.

Fisher, M.E., Isaacs, H.V., and Pownall, M.E. 2002 eFGF is required for the activation of XmyoD in the myogenic cell  lineage of Xenopus laevis. Development 129: 1307-1315.

Fisher, M.E., Isaacs, H.V., and Pownall, M.E. 2002 eFGF is required for the activation of XmyoD in the myogenic cell  lineage of Xenopus laevis. Development 129: 1307-1315.