Irene Miguel-Aliaga. Imperial College London

Internal organs are constantly exchanging signals, and can undergo profound anatomical and functional changes in response to them, even in fully developed organisms. Such organ plasticity results from a need to integrate and respond to both nutritional information and internal state, and is key to maintaining homeostasis and driving adaptive changes. Irene Miguel-Aliaga, a Professor of Genetics and Physiology at Imperial College London and Programme Leader at the MRC Clinical Sciences Centre, is exploring the mechanisms by which organs sense change and respond to it: the molecules, cellular events and physiological adaptations involved. Her lab’s work focuses primarily on the fly intestine and its neurons, which they have used to discover that digestive systems know their sex, are resized and reprogrammed during reproduction, and use their neurons to orchestrate metabolic adaptations to malnutrition and reproduction.

Imperial College London: https://www.imperial.ac.uk/
MRC Clinical Sciences Centre: http://csc.mrc.ac.uk/
Her lab: http://www.miguelaliagalab.com/