Professor Shankar Srinivas

Professor Shankar Srinivas is Shaping Destiny’s co-Principal Investigator, Professor of Developmental Biology, and DPAG’s Academic Lead for Public Engagement. Shankar founded his independent research group at the University of Oxford in 2004. His group focuses on two key questions: how movements of cells in the body help shape the early mammalian embryo and how the heart forms. Shankar is passionate about outreach and his group regularly takes part in science festivals. For Shaping Destiny, Shankar will be exploring the concept of ‘determinism’ and how certain cells are destined to create the certain body parts to which they relate (for example, primordial heart cells are destined to form the heart). However, there are limits to the role of genes – through the project, and alongside the external partners, he will investigate how our external environments and social norms influence our destiny and embodiment.

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Shankar Srinivas | Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics