It is my immense pleasure to invite you to a special Nencki Institute Seminar, which will take place on Monday, April 20th, at 3 pm in the CN Lecture Hall. We will host Prof. Magdalena Żernicka-Goetz, from the California Institute of Technology, who will give a lecture entitled: "How embryos build themselves: principles of self-organization"

One of the central questions in biology is how a complex organism develops from a single cell. How are diverse cell types generated, and how do they organise into structured tissues and organs? Prof. Magdalena Żernicka-Goetz combines experimental embryology, stem cell systems, and quantitative approaches to uncover the principles governing self-organization, symmetry breaking, and lineage specification in the embryo. She is a pioneer in developmental and stem cell biology, whose work has redefined our understanding of early mammalian embryogenesis.

Her landmark discoveries include revealing how symmetry breaking and cell fate decisions emerge in the early embryo, demonstrating that embryonic and extraembryonic tissues can self-organise into embryo-like structures from stem cells, and uncovering the fundamental role of physical forces and cell–cell interactions in shaping early development. These findings have established a new framework in which embryogenesis is understood as an emergent, self-organising process.