Dr. Cynthia Bradham

Biography

Cynthia Bradham, PhD, is an Associate Professor at Boston University in the College of Arts and Sciences, specializing in Biology. Her research centers on understanding secondary axis specification and skeletal patterning in sea urchins, which are non-chordate deuterostomes, making them ideal model organisms for systems-level developmental studies. With a focus on molecular biology, biochemistry, cell biology, computational modeling, and systems biology approaches, her work involves using gene regulatory networks to model developmental processes. Bradham's genomic analyses have revealed that sea urchins share a diversity of signaling and transcriptional molecules with vertebrates, yet lack the complexity associated with a duplicated genome. Furthermore, her research addresses the importance of larval simplicity with only 15 cell types, facilitating detailed investigations into cell specification and communication mechanisms. As a leader in the field, she has organized and contributed to numerous conferences, including the International Conference on Development of Sea Urchin Embryos. Her lab is dedicated to projects that further investigate the dorsal-ventral axis specification and larval skeleton patterning.

Research Interests

Experience