The 19th annual Aline U. and James M. Orten Memorial Lecture, sponsored by the Wayne State University School of Medicine Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, will feature a Nobel Prize winner.

Eric Wieschaus, Ph.D., winner of the 1995 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, will present "The Mechanics of Cell Shape Change During Embryonic Development" from noon to 2 p.m. March 17 in the Green Lecture Hall within Scott Hall.

Dr. Wieschaus, the Squibb Professor in Microbiology and professor of molecular biology for Princeton University and the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics, will describe recent experiments that address the questions of how cells convert patterns of activity into physical properties that control shape and motility.

His research focus is the embryonic development of drosophila melanogaster. He concentrates on zygotically active genes because he believes the temporal and spatial pattern of their transcription may provide the triggers controlling the normal sequence of embryonic development.