MRC Centre for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine
Professor Roger Pedersen
Director of MRC Centre for Stem Cell Biology and Medicine
The MRC Centre for Stem Cell Biology and Medicine provides the core support for the Cambridge Stem Cell Initiative, whose mission is to harness basic knowledge of stem cell biology and medicine for therapy for human diseases.
The Cambridge Stem Cell Initiative (www.stemcells.cam.ac.uk) will accomplish its mission by bringing together the university’s basic research with its clinical expertise. The resulting multidisciplinary research will expedite the translation of stem cell biology into regenerative medicine. The combined fundamental and translational approaches of the initiative are expected to generate insights into mechanisms of normal development as well as their perturbation in degenerative diseases, birth defects and cancer. A basic aim is to understand how stem cells preserve their pluripotency, the capacity to specialise into differentiated cell types. A related aim is to understand in greater depth how cells initiate differentiation into early tissue lineages and then use these insights to control the specialisation of stem cells into clinically useful cell types. Thirdly, research is proposed to understand how cells committed to specific tissue types maintain their proliferation during embryonic development and to apply this information to generate the large cell populations needed to study cell transplantation therapy for diseases. The cell types selected for study are ones in which purified cell populations are likely to affect the disease processes, including blood, central nervous system, heart and pancreas. A long-term multidisciplinary approach is needed because of the complexity of cells as therapeutic tools. The support provided by the MRC Centre for Stem Cell Biology and Medicine brings together leading researchers in two Cambridge faculties (School of Biological Sciences and School of Clinical Medicine) and enables them to translate their research into clinical use by providing them with dedicated stem cell research resources and a forum for collaborative interactions, including state-of-the-art stem cell culture facilities, seminars and a training programme.
Cambridge Stem Cell Initiative
University of Cambridge
Cambridge
CB2 2XY
Telephone: +44 (0)1223 763 366
Web: www.stemcells.cam.ac.uk
