Individuals produce billions of blood cells every day. The stimuli and genes that allow individual hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) to produce mature progeny such as red blood cells, white blood cells, lymphocytes and platelets has been studied in considerable depth and serves as a model system in developmental biology. However, how the multipotent HSCs is derived during embryogenesis remains poorly understood, especially in the human system.
Our lab studies focus on this beginning stage of blood development: the transition from embryonic stem cell to hematopoietic stem cell. More recently, we have emphasized studies on use of human pluripotent stem cells to produce functional human lymphocytes to provide a standardized, off-the-shelf, targeted immunotherapy to better treat and cure both hematologic malignancies and solid tumors that are refractory to current treatments.
More about our lab's research >