About EuroStemCell

Usher Institute for Population Health Sciences and Informatics

Sarah Chan is a recently-appointed Chancellor’s Fellow at the Usher Institute for Population Health Sciences and Informatics, University of Edinburgh. She was educated at the University of Melbourne, Australia, where she completed degrees in biological science and in law, and spent a number of years as a researcher in a molecular biology laboratory before moving to work in the area of science policy and stem cell ethics. In 2005 Sarah took up a Research Fellowship in Bioethics and Law at the Centre for Social Ethics and Policy, University of Manchester, where she also completed a MA in Health Care Ethics and Law and a PhD in Bioethics. From 2009 to 2015 she was Deputy Director of the Institute for Science, Ethics and Innovation, University of Manchester. Her research interests and publications cover areas including the ethics of gene therapy and genetic information, enhancement, research ethics, stem cells, animal ethics, transhumanism, and the ethics of science and innovation.

IRIBHM, Université Libre de Bruxelles

Professor Blanpain is a researcher of the Belgian FNRS and group leader at IRIBHM, Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Belgium, and is a PI in the current EuroStemCell (H2020) project. His lab is interested in understanding the role of epithelial stem cells during development, homeostasis, cancer initiation and growth.

Stem cells (SCs) have the unique capacity to self-renew and to differentiate into the cell lineages that constitute their tissue of origin. SCs are found in many adult tissues and are critical for maintaining tissue homeostasis and for regenerating damaged tissue after injuries. We are using genetic lineage tracing experiments in mice to determine how stratified epithelia are formed during embryonic development and are maintained thereafter during tissue homeostasis. We are studying how adult SCs sense and respond to DNA damage in their natural niche.

Two epithelial skin cancers are frequent in human populations: the squamous cell carcinoma and the basal cell carcinoma. The identification of the cells at the origin of these two frequent human cancers remains elusive. We are using mouse genetics to identify cells at the origin of these two frequent cancers and developed new approach to understand the molecular changes that occurred from the first oncogenic event to the development of invasive cancers.

IMBA

Jürgen Knoblich is Deputy Director and a Senior Scientist at the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (IMBA). In 2009 he was awarded the Wittgenstein Prize for his work on asymmetric cell division.

Hans Clevers is Principal Investigator at the Hubrecht Institute for Developmental Biology and Stem Cell Research (KNAW) and the Princess Máxima Center for pediatric oncology and also Professor of Molecular Genetics at the UMC Utrecht and Utrecht University, and Oncode Investigator.

Clevers discovered how the Wnt signaling pathway dictates cell fate decisions during animal embryogenesis by controlling gene expression. Looking beyond embryogenesis, he unveiled the role of Wnt signaling in colon cancer and in its physiological counterpart, the self-renewing gut epithelium. Combining these insights, he described the generic stem cell marker gene Lgr5, which has identified multiple novel adult stem cell types. Against prevailing views, these stem cells could be expanded indefinitely as organoids: mini-organs that recapitulate healthy or diseased human tissue in a dish. Organoids are rapidly gaining ground as research tools in a wide range of scientific disciplines including basic developmental and cell biology, infectiology, toxicology and research on hereditary diseases and cancer.

Fiona Watt obtained her DPhil from the University of Oxford, and carried out postdoctoral research at M.I.T, Cambridge, USA. She established her first lab at the Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology in London, and then moved to London Research Institute. From 2006 to 2012 she was Deputy Director of the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Research Institute and Deputy Director of the Wellcome Trust Centre for Stem Cell Research, University of Cambridge. She is currently Director of the Centre for Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine, Kings College London. My major research interest is in the role of stem cells in adult tissue maintenance.

Kim Jensen is an Associate Professor at BRIC, University of Copenhagen. His research focuses on tissue specific stem cells with a particular interest in the epitelial component of the small intestine and the skin.

Read an interview about Kim Jensen on EuroStemCell.

Cardiff University

Repair-HD

Professor Anne Rosser heads the South Wales clinical neurology service for HD as consultant neurologist. She chairs the UK HD research network and the UK arm of the European HD Network, and serves on the Scientific Advisory Committee of the global project Enroll-HD. As a scientist, Professor Rosser co-directs the Brain Repair Group in the Cardiff University School of Biosciences with particular responsibility for neural stem cell studies, and is the clinical director of the Cardiff Foetal Tissue Bank.

Daniel Besser studied biology at the Freie Universität Berlin and obtained his diploma in 1990. He received his PhD in 1996 from the university of Basel with a thesis from the Friedrich-Miescher-Institute, Basel on signal transduction in the gene regulation of urokinase-type plasminogen activator. He worked at Rockefeller University, New York until 2004 in the laboratories of Hidesaburo Hanafusa and James E. Darnell on Stat3 signaling and the function of c-Src; and from 2002 on pluripotency in embryonic stem cells in the lab of Ali H. Brivanlou. He has been leader of a research group at the Max-Delbrück-Center for Molecular Medicine in Berlin until 2011 focusing his research on signal transduction mechanisms in human and murine embryonic stem cells.

Since 2012 he is managing director of the German Stem Cell Network (GSCN). The GSCN is fostering national and international scientific communications, as well as developing outreach programs for schools and the general public in Germany.

Paolo De Coppi is a Consultant Paediatric Surgeon at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH), and Reader and Head of Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine at the UCL Institute of Child Health in London.

He has been an Honorary Professor at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, since 2013, an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, since 2009 and an Honorary Assistant Professor in Paediatric Surgery at the University of Padua, Italy, since 2005. He co-ordinates the EU Horizon2020 funded stem cell research consortium - INTENS which aims to aims to make a functional reconstructed bowel for people with Short Bowel Syndrome.

Laboratory of Stem Cell Biology and Pharmacology of Neurodegenerative Diseases, University of Milan

Professor Elena Cattaneo is Director of the Laboratory of Stem Cell Biology and Pharmacology of Neurodegenerative Diseases at the Department of Pharmacological Sciences, as well as a co-founder and first appointed Director of UniStem, the Centre for Stem Cell Research of the University of Milano. The main research theme of her lab is neural stem cells, and the molecular pathophysiology of Huntington’s Disease.

Funders of Prof Cattaneo's lab include the Huntington's Disease Society of America (H.D.S.A.), Hereditary Disease Foundation,High Q Foundation, the European Union (through EuroStemCell, NeuroStemcell, ESTOOLS, NeuroNE, STEM-HD and Stem-stroke projects), Fondazione Cariplo, and Telethon Italy.

Prof Cattaneo is a Coalition Investigator of the Huntington's Disease Society of America (H.D.S.A.), and a member of the Board of Directors of several European consortia (including EuroStemCell and NeuroNE). She acts as a reviewer for several journals (including Science, Nature Neuroscience, Nature Genetics, and Journal of Neuroscience) and international funding agencies, and is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Hereditary Disease Foundation and of the Euro-HD Network.

Prof Cattaneo's studies on neural stem cells and Huntington's disease saw her awarded the “Le Scienze” Price for Medicine and a Gold Medal from the President of the Italian Republic in 2001. In 2005 she was awarded the Marisa Bellisario and Chiara D’Onofrio prizes, in 2006 was nominated Cavaliere Ufficiale (Knight) of the Italian Republic, and in 2013 was appointed senator for life by Italy's president, Giorgio Napolitano. She was also named Stem Cell Person of the Year in 2013 by Paul Knoepfler and the readers of his blog, and awarded the ISSCR Public Service Award in 2014, with Paolo Bianco and Michele De Luca, for "their recent involvement in public debate and policy-making in Italy, championing rigorous scientific and medical standards and stringent regulatory oversight in the introduction of new stem cell treatments into the clinic."

Prof Cattaneo has published 105 papers in peer-reviewed journals, has given more than 200 invited lectures, and is very active in organizing professional development and outreach events - for both the scientific community and lay public.

Freddy Radtke obtained his Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from the University of Zürich in 1994. In 1995, he started his postdoctoral research in the laboratory of Michel Aguet at Genentech, Inc. (San Francisco, USA). In 1997, he returned to Switzerland with Michel Aguet and finished his postdoctoral fellowship at the Swiss Institute for Experimental Cancer Research (ISREC) in Lausanne. From 1999‑2005, he was a group leader and Associate Member at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research. Freddy Radtke then joined ISREC in January 2006 as a senior scientist and in July 2006, he was appointed Associate Professor at the EPFL School of Life Sciences.

Professor Andrew Webster has been Professor in the Sociology of Science and Technology at York since 1999. He is also the Director of the Science and Technology Studies Unit at York which he established originally at Anglia Ruskin University in 1988. He has held a visiting fellowships at ANU, Sydney and Gothenburg universities.

He was Head of the Department of Sociology at York between 2004-9 and then Dean of Social Sciences and member of the University's Senior Management Group until 2013.He has directed national research programmes for the ESRC and MRC in the fields of emerging health technologies and stem cells, and held major grants from UK research councils and the European Commission.

He was elected Fellow of the Academy of Social Science in 2007.

Andrew serves on a number of editorial and scientific advisory boards as well as national policy committees including the UK Stem Cell Bank Steering Committee, the Regenerative Medicine Expert Group Sub-committee, and the Scientific Advisory Committee, Pharmacy Research UK, as well as member of various UK and international academic bodies including, the BSA, EASST, and the Dutch WTMC's International Scientific Board.

University of Warsaw, Faculty of Biology

Department of Cytology

Maria A. Ciemerych is a developmental and cell biologist focusing on mammalian development, stem cells, and regenerative medicine. She completed her MSc and PhD at the Department of Embryology, Faculty of Biology, University of Warsaw, studying the initial stages and cell cycle regulation during preimplantation mammalian development. She continued to analyse early mouse embryo during her pre- and postdoctoral trainings at Manchester University, Welcome/CRC - University of Cambridge and Jacques Monod Institute - University Paris 7. Finally she moved for 3 years to Dana Farber Cancer Institute – Harvard Medical School, where she was focusing on cell cycle regulation not only in mouse embryos but also in stem cells. After her return to Warsaw, she got involved in the studies on skeletal muscle regeneration and myogenic differentiation of various stem cells, including embryonic stem cells and mesenchymal stem cells. In 2006 she became a head of the Department of Cytology, Faculty of Biology, University of Warsaw.  For the last 4 years she has served as a dean for research at the Faculty of Biology, University of Warsaw. Being a scientist, she also actively popularises science during various outreach activities.