Tatjana Piotrowski, Ph.D., a developmental biologist, joined the Stowers Institute in 2011 as an Associate Investigator and was promoted to full Investigator in 2018.

Born in Herrenberg, Germany, Piotrowski received a B.S. in biology and an M.S. in zoology from the University of Tübingen. She completed her masters thesis with R.G. Northcutt, Ph.D., at the University of California, San Diego, where she first started studying the anatomy and evolution of the nervous system in fish. After returning to Germany, she earned a Ph.D. in the laboratory of Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard, Ph.D., at the Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the laboratory of Igor Dawid, Ph.D., at the National Institutes of Health’s Laboratory of Molecular Genetics in Bethesda, Maryland. In both labs she studied craniofacial and nervous system development in zebrafish.

The Piotrowski Lab aims to dissect complex developmental and regenerative processes in vivo and at high resolution. The team studies these processes both at the cellular and molecular/genomics level using the sensory lateral line of zebrafish as a relatively simple system to shed light on the molecular and cellular basis of complex vertebrate development and regeneration. The lateral line is an ideal organ to mechanistically dissect embryonic and post-embryonic processes because of 1) the accessibility of the sensory organs to direct observation and manipulation; 2) the relative simplicity of the lateral line system; 3) the similarity between lateral line hair cells and inner ear hair cells; 4) their ability to regenerate; and 5) the genetic tools available in zebrafish to molecularly dissect lateral line development.

Piotrowski and her team continue to focus on the molecular and genetic processes involved in development and regeneration, and believe that uncovering the responsible mechanisms may pave the way for engineering organ regeneration in other species like humans.