Nicole King | Research UC Berkeley

Research Expertise and Interest

choanoflagellates, multicellularity, evolution of animals, host-microbe interactions, bacterial cues

Research Description

Nicole King is an Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute and a professor of genetics, genomics, and development.

Research
The origin of animals represents one of the pivotal transitions in life’s history, and one of its greatest unsolved mysteries. While the fossil record remains silent regarding the rise of multicellularity, the genetic and developmental foundations of animal origins may be deduced from shared elements among extant animals and their protozoan relatives, the choanoflagellates. To better understand the origin and evolution of animals, the King Lab goals are to:

determine the minimal genomic complexity of the unicellular progenitors of animals
elucidate the ancestral functions of genes required for animal development
characterize choanoflagellate cell and developmental biology

In the News

a ball of blue blobs with hundreds of orange hairs sticking out

Creature the Size of a Dust Grain Found Hiding in California’s Mono Lake

Colonies of these choanoflagellates — members of a group considered to be the closest living relatives of all animals — have their own unique microbiomes.

Six UC Berkeley Scientists Elected Lifetime Fellows of AAAS

Six UC Berkeley researchers have been elected 2023 Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world’s largest general scientific society and publisher of the Science family of journals.

collage of the six new NAS members, two women, four men

Six Berkeley Faculty Members Elected to National Academy of Sciences

Membership is a widely accepted mark of excellence in science and is considered one of the highest honors that a scientist can receive.

A mating swarm of the marine choanoflagellate S. rosetta

Bacteria act as aphrodisiac for the closest relatives of animals

Choanoflagellates seem to take cues from bacteria when choosing their life trajectory

Howard Hughes Medical Institute names three new campus investigators

Nicole King, Russell Vance and Michael Rape took different routes to UC Berkeley’s Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, but they’ve ended up with one of the mostly highly sought positions at any American university: a fully subsidized appointment, with added research funds, as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) investigator.

Did bacteria spark evolution of multicellular life?

A new UC Berkeley study now suggests that bacteria may have helped kick off one of the key events in evolution: the leap from one-celled organisms to many-celled organisms, a development that eventually led to all animals, including humans.

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