Morphogenesis refers to the generation of form in Biology. Our group is interested in understanding the biophysical basis of morphogenesis, how an unpatterned blob of cells develops into a fully structured and formed organism. We combine theory and experiment, and investigate force generation on multiple scales. At the level of cells and tissues we study how the actomyosin cell cortex self contracts, reshapes and deforms, and how these morphogenetic activities couple to regulatory biochemical pathways. At the level of molecules we investigate force generation and movement of individual molecules of RNA polymerases in the context of gene expression and transcriptional proofreading.