 Following postdoctoral work at the LMB and at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center with Harold M. Weintraub and Steve McKnight in Seattle he moved to the University of California, Berkeley in 1985.Harland's research aims to understand early developmental biology of vertebrates at the molecular level.Major contributions include understanding the early embryo, and the induction and patterning of the neural plate and the Spemann-Mangold organizer.