Cardiovascular Development: Advances in Developmental Biology

In 1993, Rolf Bodmer described a gene he named tinman that was required for the formation of the dorsal aorta of the fly. Flies without a functional tinman gene had no heart. Quickly, mammalian counterparts of the tinman gene were identified and found to be expressed by early cardiomyogenic precursors and by cardiomyocytes throughout heart development. Since then, significant progress has been made in the understanding of molecular and genetic determinants of heart formation. An ever growing number of genes have been identified that are required for cardiogenesis, as evidenced by severe abnormalities in cardiac development produced by inactivation in the mouse or inhibition of gene function in other model organisms. Cardiovascular Development covers some of the latest research in the study of heart formation. Volume Editor Rolf Bodmer has assembled a world-class list of contributors whose research uses a variety of animal models and whose findings are certain to enhance our understanding of this exciting field.

* Ties together the development of heart morphology and conduction system * The latest developments in vertebrate and invertebrate genetic model systems* Technological advancements in cardiovascular science

Paul M. Wassarman, the Series Editor of CTDB since 2007, is Professor in the Dept. Developmental and Regenerative Biology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. He received a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Brandeis University where he carried out thesis research in the Graduate Dept. Biochemistry with Professor Nathan O. Kaplan. In 1967 Wassarman joined the Division of Structural Studies at the MRC, Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, England as a Helen Hay Whitney Foundation Fellow with Sir John C. Kendrew. In 1972 he joined the faculty of the Dept. Biological Chemistry at Harvard Medical School and in 1986 moved to the Roche Institute of Molecular Biology where he was Chair of the Dept. Cell and Developmental Biology and Adjunct Professor in the Dept. Cell Biology, New York University School of Medicine. In 1996 he moved to the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai where he was the Lillian and Henry M. Stratton Professorial Chair of the Dept. Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology. Wassarman has published more than 200 research papers and reviews, dealing primarily with mammalian oogenesis, fertilization, and early embryogenesis.