The people behind the papers – Xueqi Jia and Ryoichiro Kageyama

Temporal-spatial regulation of somite formation is controlled by the oscillating signals of the segmentation clock, such as Hes7, but how these signals are themselves coordinated remain unclear. In their latest study, Kageyama and colleagues identify Cdh2 as a previously unreported downstream target of Hes7 that is functionally important for the timing of somite formation by both synchronising the oscillations of Hes7 and modulating the oscillations of fellow clock component ppERK. To find out more about the researchers behind the paper and how this story developed, we spoke to first author Xueqi Jia and corresponding author Ryoichiro Kageyama, Director of the RIKEN Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research.