Über EuroStemCell

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.

German Stem Cell Network

Max-Delbrück-Center for Molecular Medicine

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 for the last 8 years focusing his research on signal transduction mechanisms in human and murine embryonic stem cells.

He is currently coordinating an initiative to establish a network for stem cell research in Germany. In addition to fostering national and international scientific communications, the network will also develop outreach programs for schools and the general public in Germany.

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.

Institute of Reconstrutive Neurobiology, University of Bonn Medical Center

Life & Brain

Oliver Brüstle is a neuropathologist and a renowned expert in stem cell research. Following research activities at the University of Zurich and the NIH in Bethesda, Maryland, he now serves as Professor of Reconstructive Neurobiology at the University of Bonn Medical Center.

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.

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.

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.

Centre for Stem Cell Biology, University of Sheffield

Prof. Andrews is Co-Director of the Centre for Stem Cell Biology at the University of Sheffield and leader of its Stem Cells and Cancer research group. The appearance of genetically abnormal cells aising from pluripotent stem cells in culture offers a unique model to study the initiation and progression of cancer cells. These models will allow the identification of critical genes which are responsible for the cancer-like properties of cells and may lead to novel strategies and therapies for treatment.

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.