We are pleased to welcome Dr. Maureen Sampson, postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Steven Sloan at Emory University, for a seminar on Wednesday, November 12th!

Dr. Maureen Sampson is a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Steven Sloan at Emory University in Atlanta, GA. Her research interests focus on the molecular mechanisms of corticogenesis and how their perturbation by environmental and genetic factors contribute to neurodevelopmental disorder risk. Her recent findings suggest that exposure to the heavy metal lead shifts neural lineage trajectories—promoting neurogenesis at the expense of astrogenesis. This study provides evidence of the cell fate change using orthogonal approaches and integrating multiple complimentary tools including: hiPSC organoids, primary fetal tissue, bulk and single-cell RNA-seq, single-cell clonal lineage tracing, and fetal cell xenotransplantation into a murine brain. After making initial observations in hiPSC organoids, we performed single-cell lineage tracing of primary fetal cells exposed to lead and then transplanted into an unexposed mouse brain where they expanded for 7 weeks. Remarkably, we found that this transient, low level lead exposure induced persistent transcriptional changes in glial progenitor populations and decreased both astrocytes and glial progenitor cells in cycling cell clones.