Professor Simon M. Hughes is an  MRC Scientist and Professor of Developmental Cell Biology.  

He studied Biochemistry and did his PhD with Dr Martin D. Brand at the University of Cambridge, followed by postdoctoral training with Professor Martin C. Raff at University College London and Professor Helen M. Blau at Stanford University, where he was a Lucille P. Markey Visiting Fellow.  He became a group leader in the MRC Muscle and Cell Motility Unit at KCL in 1992 and a member of MRC External Scientific Staff with MRC Programme Grant support in 2002.  

His laboratory uses molecular genetic, cell biological and biophysical approaches to study the development, growth and repair of skeletal and cardiac striated muscle and associated tissues in a variety of vertebrate models, principally the zebrafish.  Current interests include the aetiology and prevention of ageing-related muscle weakening (sarcopenia), mechanisms of mechanosensing and muscle growth, muscle stem cell diversity and its control, inherited muscle diseases and their treatment and the evolutionary biology of striated muscle.