Stuart Newman

Last updated
Stuart Newman
Born
Stuart Alan Newman

(1945-04-04) April 4, 1945 (age 79)
New York City, New York
Alma mater Columbia University
University of Chicago
Scientific career
Fields Developmental Biology
Evolutionary Biology
Institutions State University of New York at Albany
New York Medical College
Doctoral advisor Stuart A. Rice

Stuart Alan Newman (born April 4, 1945 in New York City) is a professor of cell biology and anatomy at New York Medical College in Valhalla, NY, United States. His research centers around three program areas: cellular and molecular mechanisms of vertebrate limb development, physical mechanisms of morphogenesis, and mechanisms of morphological evolution. He also writes about social and cultural aspects of biological research and technology. [1]

Contents

Career

Stuart Newman graduated from Jamaica High School in Queens, New York. He received an A.B. from Columbia College of Columbia University in 1965, and a Ph.D. in chemical physics from the University of Chicago in 1970, where he worked with the theoretical chemist, Stuart A. Rice. He was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Theoretical Biology, University of Chicago and the School of Biological Sciences, University of Sussex, UK, and before joining New York Medical College was an instructor in anatomy at the University of Pennsylvania and an assistant professor of biological sciences at the State University of New York at Albany.

He has been a visiting professor at the Pasteur Institute, Paris, the Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique -Saclay, the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, the University of Tokyo, Komaba, and was a Fogarty Senior International Fellow at Monash University, Australia. He is a member of the External Faculty of the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research, Klosterneuburg, Austria and in 2015 was appointed editor-in-chief of the institute's journal Biological Theory . He is a director of the Indigenous Peoples Council on Biocolonialism, Nixon, NV and was a founding member of the Council for Responsible Genetics, Cambridge, MA, and of the editorial board of the Journal of Biosciences (Bangalore).

Newman's work in developmental biology includes a proposed mechanism for patterning of the vertebrate limb skeleton based on the self-organization of embryonic tissues. [2] [3] [4] He has also characterized a biophysical effect in extracellular matrices populated with cells or nonliving particles, "matrix-driven translocation," that provides a physical model for morphogenesis of mesenchymal tissues. [5] He is co-author, with the physicist Gabor Forgacs, of the textbook Biological Physics of the Developing Embryo (Cambridge University Press, 2005).

His work in evolutionary biology includes a theory for the origination of the animal phyla. This is proposed to have been driven by new physical morphogenetic and patterning effects set into motion when the products of the ancient developmental toolkit genes first came to operate on the multicellular scale in the late Precambrian-early Cambrian. The resulting forms were then "locked in" by stabilizing selection. [6] [7] [8]

Newman has proposed a theory for the evolution of cell differentiation in animals. Based on a detailed consideration of gene regulatory components and processes that distinguish this group from all other forms of life, including their nearest holozoan relatives, he has suggested that the topologically associating domains found in the nuclei of metazoan cells had a unique propensity to amplify and exaggerate inherent physiological and structural functionalities of unicellular ancestors. [9]

With the evolutionary biologist Gerd B. Müller, Newman edited Origination of Organismal Form (MIT Press, 2003). This book on evolutionary developmental biology is a collection of papers by various researchers on generative mechanisms that were plausibly involved in the origination of disparate body forms during the Ediacaran and early Cambrian periods. Particular attention is given to epigenetic factors, such as physical determinants and environmental parameters, that may have led to the rapid emergence of body plans and organ forms during a period when multicellular organisms had relatively plastic morphologies. [10]

Newman has advanced a novel scenario for the origin of birds, the Thermogenic Muscle Hypothesis. Characteristic anatomical specializations of birds, e.g., bipedality, the capacity for flight, are proposed to be secondary to the hyperplasia of thigh and breast skeletal muscles that arose in compensation for the loss of several genes in saurian ancestors. [11] [12]

He has long warned of dangers associated with lax regulations of genetic engineering of microorganisms and the potential of laboratory manipulation to create new bacterial and viral pathogens. [13] In May of 2020 he was among the earliest scientists to speak publicly about the possibility that the COVID-19 pandemic virus SARS-CoV-2 was constructed in a laboratory. [14]

Newman has also been an outspoken critic of proposed uses of developmental biology to modify human species identity, including cloning and germline genetic manipulation. [15] In 1997, in order to encourage public discussion of these emerging technologies, he applied for a U.S. patent on a human-nonhuman chimera, a composite organism (like the "geep") arising from a mixture of embryonic cells of two or more species. [16] [17] Although the patent was ultimately denied, [18] it raised Constitutional and moral questions and was the subject of numerous articles in the legal and philosophical literature. Newman's patent application has been credited with inspiring the provision in the Leahy–Smith America Invents Act of 2011 that "no patent may issue on a claim directed to or encompassing a human organism." [19] His book, Biotech Juggernaut: Hope, Hype, and Hidden Agendas of Entrepreneurial Bioscience (Routledge, 2019), written with the historian M.L. Tina Stevens, describes the rise of the field of human-oriented biotechnology and presents the scientific case against engineering human embryos.

See also

Related Research Articles

Developmental biology is the study of the process by which animals and plants grow and develop. Developmental biology also encompasses the biology of regeneration, asexual reproduction, metamorphosis, and the growth and differentiation of stem cells in the adult organism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Embryo</span> Multicellular diploid eukaryote in its earliest stage of development

An embryo is the initial stage of development for a multicellular organism. In organisms that reproduce sexually, embryonic development is the part of the life cycle that begins just after fertilization of the female egg cell by the male sperm cell. The resulting fusion of these two cells produces a single-celled zygote that undergoes many cell divisions that produce cells known as blastomeres. The blastomeres are arranged as a solid ball that when reaching a certain size, called a morula, takes in fluid to create a cavity called a blastocoel. The structure is then termed a blastula, or a blastocyst in mammals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Evolutionary developmental biology</span> Comparison of organism developmental processes

Evolutionary developmental biology is a field of biological research that compares the developmental processes of different organisms to infer how developmental processes evolved.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cellular differentiation</span> Developmental biology

Cellular differentiation is the process in which a stem cell changes from one type to a differentiated one. Usually, the cell changes to a more specialized type. Differentiation happens multiple times during the development of a multicellular organism as it changes from a simple zygote to a complex system of tissues and cell types. Differentiation continues in adulthood as adult stem cells divide and create fully differentiated daughter cells during tissue repair and during normal cell turnover. Some differentiation occurs in response to antigen exposure. Differentiation dramatically changes a cell's size, shape, membrane potential, metabolic activity, and responsiveness to signals. These changes are largely due to highly controlled modifications in gene expression and are the study of epigenetics. With a few exceptions, cellular differentiation almost never involves a change in the DNA sequence itself. However, metabolic composition does get altered quite dramatically where stem cells are characterized by abundant metabolites with highly unsaturated structures whose levels decrease upon differentiation. Thus, different cells can have very different physical characteristics despite having the same genome.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Multicellular organism</span> Organism that consists of more than one cell

A multicellular organism is an organism that consists of more than one cell, in contrast to unicellular organism. All species of animals, land plants and most fungi are multicellular, as are many algae, whereas a few organisms are partially uni- and partially multicellular, like slime molds and social amoebae such as the genus Dictyostelium.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Endosperm</span> Starchy tissue inside cereals and alike

The endosperm is a tissue produced inside the seeds of most of the flowering plants following double fertilization. It is triploid in most species, which may be auxin-driven. It surrounds the embryo and provides nutrition in the form of starch, though it can also contain oils and protein. This can make endosperm a source of nutrition in animal diet. For example, wheat endosperm is ground into flour for bread, while barley endosperm is the main source of sugars for beer production. Other examples of endosperm that forms the bulk of the edible portion are coconut "meat" and coconut "water", and corn. Some plants, such as orchids, lack endosperm in their seeds.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Regeneration (biology)</span> Biological process of renewal, restoration, and tissue growth

Regeneration in biology is the process of renewal, restoration, and tissue growth that makes genomes, cells, organisms, and ecosystems resilient to natural fluctuations or events that cause disturbance or damage. Every species is capable of regeneration, from bacteria to humans. Regeneration can either be complete where the new tissue is the same as the lost tissue, or incomplete after which the necrotic tissue becomes fibrotic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Symmetry in biology</span> Geometric symmetry in living beings

Symmetry in biology refers to the symmetry observed in organisms, including plants, animals, fungi, and bacteria. External symmetry can be easily seen by just looking at an organism. For example, the face of a human being has a plane of symmetry down its centre, or a pine cone displays a clear symmetrical spiral pattern. Internal features can also show symmetry, for example the tubes in the human body which are cylindrical and have several planes of symmetry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Heterochrony</span> Evolutionary change

In evolutionary developmental biology, heterochrony is any genetically controlled difference in the timing, rate, or duration of a developmental process in an organism compared to its ancestors or other organisms. This leads to changes in the size, shape, characteristics and even presence of certain organs and features. It is contrasted with heterotopy, a change in spatial positioning of some process in the embryo, which can also create morphological innovation. Heterochrony can be divided into intraspecific heterochrony, variation within a species, and interspecific heterochrony, phylogenetic variation, i.e. variation of a descendant species with respect to an ancestral species.

<i>Origination of Organismal Form</i> 2003 biology anthology edited by Gerd Müller and Stuart A. Newman

Origination of Organismal Form: Beyond the Gene in Developmental and Evolutionary Biology is an anthology published in 2003 edited by Gerd B. Müller and Stuart A. Newman. The book is the outcome of the 4th Altenberg Workshop in Theoretical Biology on "Origins of Organismal Form: Beyond the Gene Paradigm", hosted in 1999 at the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research. It has been cited over 200 times and has a major influence on extended evolutionary synthesis research.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pattern formation</span> Study of how patterns form by self-organization in nature

The science of pattern formation deals with the visible, (statistically) orderly outcomes of self-organization and the common principles behind similar patterns in nature.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Body plan</span> Set of morphological features common to members of a phylum of animals

A body plan, Bauplan, or ground plan is a set of morphological features common to many members of a phylum of animals. The vertebrates share one body plan, while invertebrates have many.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Structuralism (biology)</span> Attempt to explain evolution by forces other than natural selection

Biological or process structuralism is a school of biological thought that objects to an exclusively Darwinian or adaptationist explanation of natural selection such as is described in the 20th century's modern synthesis. It proposes instead that evolution is guided differently, basically by more or less physical forces which shape the development of an animal's body, and sometimes implies that these forces supersede selection altogether.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Limb development</span>

Limb development in vertebrates is an area of active research in both developmental and evolutionary biology, with much of the latter work focused on the transition from fin to limb.

Within the field of developmental biology, one goal is to understand how a particular cell develops into a final cell type, known as fate determination. Within an embryo, several processes play out at the cellular and tissue level to create an organism. These processes include cell proliferation, differentiation, cellular movement and programmed cell death. Each cell in an embryo receives molecular signals from neighboring cells in the form of proteins, RNAs and even surface interactions. Almost all animals undergo a similar sequence of events during very early development, a conserved process known as embryogenesis. During embryogenesis, cells exist in three germ layers, and undergo gastrulation. While embryogenesis has been studied for more than a century, it was only recently that scientists discovered that a basic set of the same proteins and mRNAs are involved in embryogenesis. Evolutionary conservation is one of the reasons that model systems such as the fly, the mouse, and other organisms are used as models to study embryogenesis and developmental biology. Studying model organisms provides information relevant to other animals, including humans. While studying the different model systems, cells fate was discovered to be determined via multiple ways, two of which are by the combination of transcription factors the cells have and by the cell-cell interaction. Cells' fate determination mechanisms were categorized into three different types, autonomously specified cells, conditionally specified cells, or syncytial specified cells. Furthermore, the cells' fate was determined mainly using two types of experiments, cell ablation and transplantation. The results obtained from these experiments, helped in identifying the fate of the examined cells.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nicole Marthe Le Douarin</span> French biologist

Nicole Marthe Le Douarin is a developmental biologist known for her studies of chimeras, which have led to critical insights regarding higher animal nervous and immune systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">HOXD13</span> Protein

Homeobox protein Hox-D13 is a protein that in humans is encoded by the HOXD13 gene. This gene belongs to the homeobox family of genes. The homeobox genes encode a highly conserved family of transcription factors that play an important role in morphogenesis in all multicellular organisms.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gerd B. Müller</span> Austrian biologist (born 1953)

Gerd B. Müller is an Austrian biologist who is emeritus professor at the University of Vienna where he was the head of the Department of Theoretical Biology in the Center for Organismal Systems Biology. His research interests focus on vertebrate limb development, evolutionary novelties, evo-devo theory, and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis. He is also concerned with the development of 3D based imaging tools in developmental biology.

<i>Volvox carteri</i> Species of alga

Volvox carteri is a species of colonial green algae in the order Volvocales. The V. carteri life cycle includes a sexual phase and an asexual phase. V. carteri forms small spherical colonies, or coenobia, of 2000–6000 Chlamydomonas-type somatic cells and 12–16 large, potentially immortal reproductive cells called gonidia. While vegetative, male and female colonies are indistinguishable; however, in the sexual phase, females produce 35-45 eggs and males produce up to 50 sperm packets with 64 or 128 sperm each.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Turing pattern</span> Concept from evolutionary biology

The Turing pattern is a concept introduced by English mathematician Alan Turing in a 1952 paper titled "The Chemical Basis of Morphogenesis" which describes how patterns in nature, such as stripes and spots, can arise naturally and autonomously from a homogeneous, uniform state. The pattern arises due to Turing instability which in turn arises due to the interplay between differential diffusion of chemical species and chemical reaction. The instability mechanism is unforeseen because a pure diffusion process would be anticipated to have a stabilizing influence on the system.

References

  1. ↑ Chuong C-M (2009). "Limb pattern, physical mechanisms and morphological evolution – an interview with Stuart A. Newman". The International Journal of Developmental Biology. 53 (5–6): 663–671. doi: 10.1387/ijdb.072553cc . PMID   19557675.
  2. ↑ Newman SA, Frisch HL (1979). "Dynamics of skeletal pattern formation in developing chick limb". Science. 205 (4407): 662–668. Bibcode:1979Sci...205..662N. doi:10.1126/science.462174. PMID   462174. S2CID   44653825.
  3. ↑ Zhu J, Zhang YT, Alber MS, Newman SA (2010). "Bare bones pattern formation: a core regulatory network in varying geometries reproduces major features of vertebrate limb development and evolution". PLOS ONE. 5 (5): e:10892. Bibcode:2010PLoSO...510892Z. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0010892 . PMC   2878345 . PMID   20531940.
  4. ↑ Sheth R, Marcon L, Bastida MF, Junco M, Quintana L, Dahn R, Kmita M, Sharpe J, Ros MA (2012). "Hox genes regulate digit patterning by controlling the wavelength of a Turing-type mechanism". Science. 338 (6113): 1476–1480. Bibcode:2012Sci...338.1476S. doi:10.1126/science.1226804. PMC   4486416 . PMID   23239739.
  5. ↑ Newman SA, Frenz DA, Tomasek JJ, Rabuzzi DD (1985). "Matrix-driven translocation of cells and nonliving particles". Science. 228 (4701): 885–889. Bibcode:1985Sci...228..885N. doi:10.1126/science.4001925. PMID   4001925.
  6. ↑ Newman SA, Forgacs G, Müller GB (2006). "Before programs: the physical origination of multicellular forms". The International Journal of Developmental Biology. 50 (2–3): 289–299. doi: 10.1387/ijdb.052049sn . PMID   16479496.
  7. ↑ Newman SA, Bhat R (2009). "Dynamical patterning modules: a 'pattern language' for development and evolution of multicellular form". The International Journal of Developmental Biology. 53 (5–6): 693–705. doi: 10.1387/ijdb.072481sn . PMID   19378259.
  8. ↑ Newman SA (2012). "Physico-genetic determinants in the evolution of development". Science. 338 (6104): 217–219. Bibcode:2012Sci...338..217N. doi:10.1126/science.1222003. PMID   23066074. S2CID   206541349.
  9. ↑ Newman, SA (2020). "Cell differentiation: what have we learned in 50 years?". Journal of Theoretical Biology. 485: 110031. arXiv: 1907.09551 . Bibcode:2020JThBi.48510031N. doi: 10.1016/j.jtbi.2019.110031 . PMID   31568790.
  10. ↑ Newman SA, Müller GB (2000). "Epigenetic mechanisms of character origination". Journal of Experimental Zoology. 288 (4): 304–317. doi:10.1002/1097-010X(20001215)288:4<304::AID-JEZ3>3.0.CO;2-G. PMID   11144279.
  11. ↑ Newman SA (2011). "Thermogenesis, muscle hyperplasia, and the origin of birds". BioEssays. 33 (9): 653–656. doi:10.1002/bies.201100061. PMID   21695679. S2CID   42012034.
  12. ↑ Newman SA, Mezentseva NV, Badyaev AV (2013). "Gene loss, thermogenesis, and the origin of birds". Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. 1289 (1): 36–47. Bibcode:2013NYASA1289...36N. doi:10.1111/nyas.12090. PMID   23550607. S2CID   12240405.
  13. ↑ Newman, SA (1982). "The "Scientific" Selling of rDNA". Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development. 24: 21–57.
  14. ↑ "Did the COVID-19 pandemic begin in a lab? Part 1 - Stuart Newman (republished)" (video). youtube.com. Organic Consumers Association. May 7, 2020.
  15. ↑ Newman, Stuart A. (2003). "Averting the clone age: prospects and perils of human developmental manipulation". Journal of Contemporary Health Law & Policy. 19 (2): 431–463. PMID   14748253 . Retrieved 2015-09-29.
  16. ↑ U.S. patent application no. 08/933,564: "Chimeric Embryos and Animals Containing Human Cells."
  17. ↑ Dowie, Mark (January–February 2004). "Gods and monsters". Mother Jones. Retrieved July 4, 2011.
  18. ↑ Weiss, Rick (February 13, 2005). "U.S. denies patent for a too-human hybrid". Washington Post. Retrieved July 4, 2011.
  19. ↑ Heled, Yaniv (2014). "On patenting human organisms or how the abortion wars feed into the ownership fallacy". Cardozo Law Review. 36: 241–298.
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