Nicole King

Nicole King (born 1970) is an American evolutionary biologist, known for her research on animal origins and host-microbe interactions, especially in connection with choanoflagellates. She was elected in 2021 an Associe Étranger of the Académie des Sciences (Institut de France), in 2022 a Member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and in 2023 a Fellow of the American Academy of Sciences.

This scientist article is a stub. You can help out with Wikiquote by expanding it!

Quotes

The transition to multicellularity that launched the evolution of animals from protozoa marks one of the most pivotal, and poorly understood, events in life's history. Advances in phylogenetics and comparative genomics, and particularly the study of choanoflagellates, are yielding new insights into the biology of the unicellular progenitors of animals. Signaling and adhesion gene families critical for animal development (including receptor tyrosine kinases and cadherins) evolved in protozoa before the origin of animals. Innovations in transcriptional regulation and expansions of certain gene families may have allowed the integration of cell behavior during the earliest experiments with multicellularity. The protozoan perspective on animal origins promises to provide a valuable window into the distant past and into the cellular bases of animal development.
- (2004) . "The unicellular ancestry of animal development". Developmental Cell 7 (3): 313–325. DOI:10.1016/j.devcel.2004.08.010.

Evolutionary biologists have a secret. While our research is motivated by a desire to reconstruct life's history, it can also provide novel insights into fundamental cellular mechanisms in modern organisms. Studies of evolution reveal how the cell's component parts were “assembled” over time, how and why cells are vulnerable to disease and death, the molecular mechanisms that are responsible for fundamental cellular processes, and those mechanisms that distinguish the morphology and physiology of different lineages of organisms from each other. Studies of “evolutionary cell biology” promise to deepen our understanding of how cells function.
- (2010) . "Nature and nurture in the evolution of cell biology". Molecular Biology of the Cell 21 (22): 3801–3802. DOI:10.1091/mbc.e10-05-0419.

... in the closing line of Darwin's Origin of Species, he remarked on 'endless forms most beautiful', and he was referring to the incredible diversity of body plans ... much of his research and thinking had to with trying to understand: How do we get this diversity of organisms? And, there's been a great deal of progress in this regard, largely from the work of embryologists, evolutionary biologists, and geneticists working together to try to understand what are molecular mechanistic underpinnings of the diversification of animal body plans. ... Animals are united by their shared ancestry. They all share a common ancestor … And, in fact, we know relatively little about the nature of that organism.
- (April 7, 2015) "Nicole King (UC Berkeley, HHMI), 1: The origin of animal multicellularity". Science Communication Lab, YouTube. (quote at 1:07 of 26:53 in video; part 1 of 2 in talk)