Research

Our research program bridges gaps in traditional funding to encourage bold thinking and nurture scientific careers.

We strive to create a highly collaborative environment with multiple channels of interaction, which gives rise to new ideas, new programs, and the resources to support them.

Disease Programs

We channel world-class resources, both intellectual and technological, toward some of the most prevalent, devastating diseases for which stem cell research holds promise. 

HSCI provides early funding for innovative projects in stem cell research through Seed Grants, Junior Faculty Programs, and the Barry Family HSCI Innovation Award. These focused funds allow scientists to pursue "high risk/high reward" avenues of research that might be difficult to fund from more traditional sources.

HSCI also recognizes the achievements of early-stage researchers at an annual retreat, which is a unique opportunity for our researchers to connect with one another and forge new collaborations.

Ya-Chieh Hsu with award-winning members of her lab at the HSCI 2019 annual retreat
Ya-Chieh Hsu with award-winning members of her lab at the HSCI 2019 annual retreat

Seed Grants

We support ideas that are not typically funded by traditional sources, either because the research is too early-stage or the researcher too junior to compete with larger laboratories.

Junior Faculty Programs

We support highly collaborative, “high risk, high reward” projects in which young HSCI faculty with diverse expertise pool their efforts to tackle a major, shared challenge.

Barry Family HSCI Innovation Award

We support innovation by early career investigators that has the potential to transform the field of stem cell research.

Our approach

Stem cells have already changed medicine, saving the lives of leukemia patients for over 50 years. Today, technological breakthroughs have opened up vast potential to use stem cells to understand and treat human disease. HSCI researchers are harnessing the potential of stem cells in a number of ways:

Replace

Different types of stem cells can be used to develop cell-replacement therapies. For example, a diabetes patient’s damaged insulin-producing cells could be replaced with healthy ones created from stem cells, which have been corrected using gene editing. We are expanding this approach to address many diseases.

Reprogram

Stem cells can be reprogrammed to become specific tissues, such as neurons or heart tissues. This helps scientists study human diseases directly in a dish, and test a potential treatment safely outside the body before giving it to a patient.

Repair

Understanding how different organs repair themselves following injury or disease helps HSCI scientists identify ways to stimulate a patient’s own stem cells to regenerate, for example using drugs to regrow inner ear cells and restore hearing.

Learn more about stem cells and medicine

Comprehensive resources are hosted by the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) and the Alliance for Regenerative Medicine.

ISSCR's A Closer Look at Stem Cells

Alliance for Regenerative Medicine

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