Research
Dr Jowett completed her undergraduate degree in human developmental and regenerative biology at Harvard University. Here, she joined Prof Lee Rubin’s lab to create genetically engineered stem cell models of Parkinson’s disease. She then moved to King’s College London with a Wellcome trust PhD studentship to further pursue her interest in modelling human biology. Under the interdisciplinary co-supervision of Dr Eileen Gentleman and Dr Joana Neves, she developed complex co-culture systems of innate lymphoid cells and mucosal organoids in 3D synthetic hydrogels. She harnessed this approach to uncover how this sentinel immune population develops and interacts with the epithelium in the context of Inflammatory Bowel Disease.
As a Schmidt Science Fellow in Prof Azim Surani’s group at the Gurdon Institute, she has begun applying this interdisciplinary skillset to understanding mammalian germ cell development. She is particularly intrigued by the role of physical forces, and whether these instruct the commitment to sperm or egg cell fate. She was recently awarded a Sir Henry Wellcome Fellowship with Prof Surani and Prof Paluch to investigate the potential biophysical mechanisms underlying sex determination of gametes, which could inform future in vitro gametogenesis strategies.
Publications
- Jowett, G.M., Read, E., Roberts, L.B., Coman, D., González, M.V., Zabinski, T., Niazi, U., Reis, R., Trieu, T.J., Danovi, D. and Gentleman, E., 2022. Organoids capture tissue-specific innate lymphoid cell development in mice and humans. Cell reports, 40(9).
- Jowett, G.M., Norman, M.D., Yu, T.T., Rosell Arevalo, P., Hoogland, D., Lust, S.T., Read, E., Hamrud, E., Walters, N.J., Niazi, U. and Chung, M.W.H., 2021. ILC1 drive intestinal epithelial and matrix remodelling. Nature materials, 20(2), pp.250-259.
- Jowett, G.M., Coales, I. and Neves, J.F., 2022. Organoids as a tool for understanding immune-mediated intestinal regeneration and development. Development, 149(8), p.dev199904.
- Alves-Lopes, J.P., Wong, F.C., Tang, W.W., Gruhn, W.H., Ramakrishna, N.B., Jowett, G.M., Jahnukainen, K. and Surani, M.A., 2023. Specification of human germ cell fate with enhanced progression capability supported by hindgut organoids. Cell Reports, 42(1).
- Norman, M.D., Ferreira, S.A., Jowett, G.M., Bozec, L. and Gentleman, E., 2021. Measuring the elastic modulus of soft culture surfaces and three-dimensional hydrogels using atomic force microscopy. Nature Protocols, 16(5), pp.2418-2449.
