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Lynne M. Angerer, Ph.D.

NIDCR Mourns Dr. Lynne Angerer 

Lynne M. Angerer, Ph.D.Dr. Lynne Angerer, chief of NIDCR’s Developmental Mechanisms Section, died March 30 after a long illness. Her husband and long-term scientific collaborator is NIDCR Scientific Director Dr. Bob Angerer.

“We have lost one of our leaders in science -- a brilliant researcher, a wonderful colleague, dear friend, and mentor to so many of us,” said NIDCR Director Dr. Martha Somerman. “Lynne’s death is an immeasurable loss for NIDCR, for the NIH, and for the entire research community. Her scientific contributions are enormously important and have significantly advanced our understanding of the human development process.”

Dr. Angerer was a world-renowned expert in the field of developmental biology. Using sea urchins, close cousins of vertebrates, she unraveled the core regulatory processes that direct the early development of animal embryos. She led her NIDCR lab to numerous pioneering discoveries. Among these was the revelation that some neurons are of a unique tissue origin, differentiating de novo from cells in the gut; this finding was a challenge to prevailing dogma that nerves develop only from another embryonic tissue. Her group also found numerous unexpected complex regulatory interactions that are required to prevent most cells of the embryo from adopting neural fate (Wnt signaling). One of Dr. Angerer’s major scientific accomplishments was the microarray she helped develop from the newly obtained sea urchin genome sequence, an important tool for genome-wide screens to identify genes and signaling molecules involved in early embryonic development.

Lynne Angerer and her husband were recruited to NIDCR in 2004 from the University of Rochester, where, among many accomplishments, they developed a technique of in situ hybridization to detect mRNAs using RNA probes. They applied this approach to determine when and where the early embryonic territories in the sea urchin are established, and disseminated this information widely to the biomedical research community.

Dr. Angerer was an outstanding and inspiring mentor, training many graduate students and postdocs who went on to their own successful research careers. Her strong commitment to mentoring began at Rochester, where she had been a senior research associate since 1986 and a research associate since 1978. Dr. Angerer did her post-doctoral work at Caltech in the lab of famed molecular biologist Norman Davidson. She earned a doctorate in 1973 from The Johns Hopkins University, conducting research on the structure of chromatin using biophysical methods. She received a B.Sc. in 1966 and an M.Sc. in 1967 from The Ohio State University.

Dr. Angerer is survived by her husband and two children, Jen Angerer (New York City) and Mark Angerer (Lakewood, Colo.), and many, many friends.

The family has requested that memorial contributions be made to the National MS Society [http://www.nationalmssociety.org/donate/index.aspx].


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Senior Scientist
Chief, Developmental Mechanisms Section

NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH/NIDCR
BUILDING 30 ROOM 523
30 CONVENT DR MSC 4326
BETHESDA MD 20892-4326

Biographical Sketch

Dr. Angerer received a B.Sc in 1966 and M.Sc. in 1967 from The Ohio State University, studying changes in the ultrastructure of organelles in insect hemocytes during hemolymph coagulation.  She obtained a Ph.D. in 1973 from the Department of Biology, Johns Hopkins University, conducting research on the structure of chromatin using biophysical methods.  As a post-doctoral fellow in the laboratory of Norman Davidson at Caltech, she developed methods to map gene organization using molecular and biochemical methods to label genes detectable by electron microscopy.  She then joined Bob Angerer to form a research team at the University of Rochester studying the molecular mechanisms that regulate early development of the sea urchin embryo.  They developed the technique of in situ hybridization to detect mRNAs using RNA probes and applied this approach to determine when and where the early embryonic territories in the sea urchin are established.  Their studies led to the identification of transcription factors regulating ectoderm development through cis-regulatory analyses of genes expressed in this tissue.  After moving to NIH, she became the head of the Developmental Mechanisms Section and Bob became the Scientific Director of NIDCR.  Their research group continues to investigate early patterning mechanisms in the sea urchin embryo focusing on the neuroectoderm and endomesoderm.  They developed a microarray from the newly obtained sea urchin genome sequence for genome-wide screens to identify genes important in determining the regulatory states of early embryonic cells in the presumptive ectoderm and to explore how these states are altered by intercellular signals.

Research Interests/Scientific Focus

Selected Publications

  1. Cox, K. H., DeLeon, D. V., Angerer, L. M. and Angerer, R. C., "Detection of mRNAs by in situ hybridization with asymmetric RNA probes", Dev. Biol. 101: 485-502 (1984).
  2. Reynolds, S.D., Angerer, L.M., Palis, J., Nasir, A. and Angerer, R.C. Early mRNAs, spatially restricted along the animal-vegetal axis of sea urchin embryos, include one encoding a protein related to tolloid and BMP-1. Development 114:769-786 (1992).
  3. Kenny, A.P*., Kozlowski, D.J*., Oleksyn, D.W., Angerer, L.M. and Angerer, R.C. SpSoxB1, a maternally encoded transcription factor asymmetrically distributed among early sea urchin blastomeres.” Development 126: 5473-5483 (1999).
  4. Angerer, L.M. and Angerer, R.C. “Patterning the sea urchin embryo: gene regulatory networks, signaling pathways and cellular interactions.” Current Topics Dev. Biol. 53: 159-198 (2003).
  5. Angerer, L.M., Oleksyn, D.W., Levine, A., Li, X., Klein, W.H. and Angerer, R.C. Sea urchin goosecoid function links fate specification along the animal-vegetal and oral-aboral embryonic axes.” Development 128: 4393-4404 (2001).
  6. Angerer, LM., Newman, L.A., Oleksyn, D.W. and Angerer, R.C. SoxB1 down regulation in vegetal lineages of sea urchin embryos is achieved by both transcriptional repression and selective protein turnover.” Development 132: 999-1008 (2005).
  7. Wei, Z., Angerer, R.C. and Angerer, L.M. A database of mRNA expression patterns for the sea urchin embryo. Dev. Biol. 300, 476-484 (2006).
  8. Yaguchi, S., Yaguchi, J., Angerer, R.C. and Angerer, L.M. A Wnt-FoxQ2-nodal pathway links primary and secondary axis specification in sea urchin embryos. Dev Cell 14, 97-107 (2008).
  9. Sethi, A, Angerer, R.C. and Angerer, L.M. Sea urchin Gene Regulatory Networks I Endomesoderm Induction, PLOS, Biology 7(2), e1000029 (2009)
  10. Wei, Z., Yaguchi, J., Yaguchi, S., Angerer, R. C. and Angerer, L.M. The sea urchin animal pole domain is a Six3-dependent neurogenic patterning center. Development 136, 1179-1189 (2009).
  11. Wei, Z, Angerer, RC, Angerer, LM Direct development of neurons within foregut endoderm of sea urchin embryos. Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci USA, 108, 9143-9147. Highlighted “In this issue” (2011).
  12. Angerer, LM, Yaguchi, S, Angerer, RC and Burke, RD The evolution of nervous system patterning: insights from sea urchin development. Development 138: 3613-3623 (2011).
  13. Adams, DK, Sewell, MA, Angerer, RC, and Angerer, LM Rapid adaptation to food availability by a dopamine-mediated morphogenetic response. Nature Comm, 2:592 (2011)
  14. Sethi, AS, Wikramanayake, RM, Angerer, RC, Range, R and Angerer, LM  Sequential signaling crosstalk regulates endomesoderm segregation in sea urchin embryos. Science 335:590 (2012)
  15. Wei, Z, Range, R, Angerer R and Angerer, L  Axial patterning interactions in the sea urchin embryo: suppression of nodal by Wnt1 signaling.  Development 239:1662-1669 (2012).

Complete CV and Publications (PDF File, 113KB)

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This page last updated: April 12, 2013