Email

blair.benham-pyle@bcm.edu

Positions

Assistant Professor

Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine Center
Baylor College of Medicine

Assistant Professor

Molecular and Cellular Biology
Baylor College of Medicine

Member

Dan L Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center
Houston, Texas United States

Addresses

Baylor College of Medicine Alkek Building (Lab)

Houston, TX 77030
United States

Education

BS from Yale University

New Haven, CT

Molecular Biochemistry & Biophysics

MS from Yale University

New Haven, CT

Molecular Biophysics & Biochemistry

PhD from Stanford University

Stanford, CA

Cancer Biology

Professional Interests

• Schmidtea mediterranea as a discovery platform for anti-aging and anti-cancer mechanisms
• Stem cell regulation in regenerative biology
• Molecular mechanisms that coordinate nutrition, growth, and behavior

Professional Statement

In the Benham-Pyle Laboratory, we aim to build an innovative, interdisciplinary, and accomplished team of scientists that address big questions in developmental and regenerative biology. We leverage the remarkable biology of the planarian flatworm, Schmidtea mediterranea, to study stem cells, regeneration, aging, and cancer prevention. We use methods from genomics and fluorescence microscopy to illuminate how cell types across an animal coordinate tissue function and prevent disease after injury.

Our previous work used a whole animal single cell sequencing strategy to identify three tissues that significantly alter their transcriptional output during planarian regeneration. In the muscle, a subset of anterior facing cells activate genes important for patterning and stem cell proliferation near the wound. In the epidermis, two different cell types express genes important for wound healing and stem cell maintenance. And finally, in the intestine, basal outer cells express genes important for stem cell proliferation and enterocytes express genes important for tissue remodeling. Importantly, these wound-induced cellular states are activated independent of stem cell proliferation. We named them Transient Regeneration-Activated Cell States (TRACS). Future work will determine what signaling pathways and cell types are regulated by TRACS and what role TRACS play in regeneration and repair of other types of injuries.

Planarian flatworms need to decide when to produce clonal progeny by asexual reproduction (fission). Fission rates are dependent on nutrition, size, environmental cues like temperature and mechanical forces, and the underlying regenerative capacity of the animal. We are interested in discovering how the animal senses the optimal conditions for asexual reproduction and translates that stimuli into a behavioral output. How do diverse organ systems across the animal communicate with the central nervous system to ensure that asexual reproduction is successful? Together, these studies may identify global mechanisms for the integration of animal health, the environment, and behavior.

Selected Publications

• Benham-Pyle BW, Brewster CE, Kent AM, FG Jr Mann, Chen S, Scott AR, Box AC, Sánchez Alvarado A "Identification of rare post-mitotic cell states induced by injury and required for whole-body regeneration in Schmidtea mediterranea." Nat Cell Biol.. 2021 Sep;23(9):939-952. Pubmed PMID: 34475533
• Arnold CP*, Benham-Pyle BW*, Lange JJ, Wood CJ, Sánchez Alvarado A "Wnt and TGF-beta coordinate growth and patterning to regulate size-dependent behaviour." Nature. 2019 Aug;572(7771):655-659. Pubmed PMID: 31413361

Memberships

American Society for Cell Biology

Society for Developmental Biology