Néva Meyer is an associate professor in the Biology Department at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, USA. Her research addresses questions of annelid and spiralian development with the goal of gaining a better understanding of how animal body plans evolved and diversified, particularly nervous systems, which are animal innovations. Currently, it is not known if a centralized nervous system (brain and nerve cord) evolved once, early during animal evolution, or if centralized nervous systems evolved multiple times. Her current research addresses this broad question by examining cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying central nervous system development in a phylogenetically important and understudied group of animals, the annelids, using techniques such as fate mapping, blastomere isolation, imaging, gene and signaling pathway manipulation and RNAseq.
Dr. Meyer earned a B.S. with honors in Molecular Biology from Purdue University and a Ph.D. from the University of Washington. For her Ph.D, she worked in Dr. Henk Roelink’s lab on understanding how different types of neurons are patterned along the dorsal-ventral axis of the spinal cord in chick and mouse, which was funded by an HHMI predoctoral fellowship. She also was involved in the Science Education Partnership, which integrates science into the community through outreach activities. As a result of her graduate studies, Dr. Meyer became interested in the broader question of how nervous systems evolved. She began to address this question as a postdoctoral researcher in Dr. Elaine Seaver’s lab at Kewalo Marine Lab, University of Hawaii and is continuing this research at Clark University. She is also actively engaged in making science more inclusive and supportive for everyone through a variety of activities.
Courses offered:
BIOL 102 Intro Biology (theme: opioid epidemic)
BIOL 143 Neuroscience
BIOL 221/321 Developmental Biology with lab
BIOL 239/339 Evo Devo
BIOL 240/340 Comparative and Human Physiology with lab
Degrees:
Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA, 2005
B.S. in Molecular Biology, Purdue University, W. Lafayette, IN, USA, 1998