Bahar Ahani

Bahar is a bioengineering student at the University of Pittsburgh. She has joined SCRC April 2009. She has been been working on characterizing the role of wild type MDSCs in progeroid ERCC1-XPF-deficient mice under the mentorship of Dr. Mitra Lavasani.

Dr. Chen has graduated with a PhD in Bioengineering from the SCRC. He is currently continuing his postdoctoral research which is focused upon the identification and characterization of potential stem/progenitor cell populations in the heart.

Mr. Cummins has been with Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh for the past twenty-one years. Beginning in the Department of Medical Genetics as a Cytogenetics Technologist, Mr. Cummins successfully rose to the position of Laboratory Manager there before accepting the same position and title with Dr. Huard in the Growth and Development Laboratory in 1999. After 6 productive years as Laboratory Manager, he accepted a promotion to the position of Manager of Research in January of 2006. Mr. Cummins now serves as the Senior Scientist for the Stem Cell Research Center (SCRC).

Mr. Cummins has a firm understanding of the ongoing science being performed in the laboratory, and currently acts as the lead research scientist in the SCRC. His scientific background and knowledge, combined with his keen understanding of institutional policy, make him a uniquely valuable asset to the aims and to the people of the SCRC.

Xueqin Gao, M.D., Ph.D,

Postdoctoral  Associate

Dr. Gao's Interests

Research Interest:   My research is to focus on the human muscle derived stem cells based bone and cartilage healing and the interaction of the donor stem cell and host cell. Based on the pioneer study in our lab, most healing bone tissue cells are derived from host cells, but donor cells play important role.  So, I am interested mostly in characterizing the paracrine factors of different populations  of   human muscle derived stem cells in vitro. And then I will test the healing effect of the muscle stem cell with different subpopulation isolated from human muscle derived stem cell.  I am going to investigate on the contribution of the different host cells such as inflammatory cells, immune cells, and mesenchyme cells and other cells in the stem cell based bone and cartilage healing.  This lay foundation for the translational research of muscle derived stem cell therapy.

In our lab, muscle derived stem cells (MDSCs) are isolated from the skeletal muscles of the mouse by a modification of the preplate technique. We have several projects that involve using these stem cells to regenerate and repair injured skeletal muscles in Duchenne muscular dystrophy mouse model (MDX mouse), cardiac muscle, and bone marrow. Donor cells are either engineered with reporter genes before they are injected, or they are injected without engineering. My research interest is how to best track non-engineered (normal) adult stem cells in recipient tissues, see if they proliferate, and check if they develop any chromosomal abnormalities, or if they fuse with host nuclei.

Johnny Huard, Ph.D.
SCRC Director
412.648.2789

Dr. Huard became the Director of the Growth and Development Laboratory in 1996. Since that time, the laboratory has more than tripled in size with more than 50 diverse professionals (including basic scientists, residents, post-doctoral fellows, graduate students, and administrative staff).

Dr. Huard’s main research focus is gene therapy to skeletal muscle, and he has received international recognition for his research discoveries in this area. He started to concentrate his efforts on gene therapy at the Masters level of his schooling, completing both his masters and doctoral graduate studies. He also serves within the McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine as the Deputy Director for Cellular Therapeutics, at the Center for Cell Therapeutics as director, as Associate Director of the Pittsburgh Tissue Engineering Initiative.

For more information visit our History page.

Dr. Lavasani is a research assistant professor at the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the University of Pittsburgh. She received her Bachelor of Science in Molecular Biology at San Jose State University and her M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Bioengineering at the University of Pittsburgh under the mentorship of Dr. Johnny Huard. At the SCRC, her multidisciplinary research explores the use of muscle-derived stem cells (MDSCs) transplantation to enhance axonal/glial regeneration and provide functional recovery to peripheral nervous system (PNS) injuries in murine experimental models. Her proposed stem cell-based therapy concept is based upon the ability of transplanted stem cells to transform into specific tissue cell types or to participate in the recovery process by reducing axonal degeneration and scar formation, while promoting myelination. Her models evaluate th potential for MDSCs to adopt a Schwann cell (PNS supporting cell) phenotype in vitro and in vivo, and examine their plasticity in response to environmental cues to support nerve fiber regeneration and re-myelination.

Dr. Lavasani is also working on characterizing the role of aging using murine experimental models of genetically engineered mice with dramatically shortened lifespan with age-related pathologies. Her goal is to use wild type MDSCs-transplantation to delay or ameliorate the pathologies associated with aging using the mouse models of progeroid ERCC1-XPF-deficient mice.

She has won multiple awards, including the New Investigator Recognition Award (NIRA) at 53rd Annual ORS Meeting (2007); first place in the Scientific Retreat Poster Contest for Cellular Therapies at the McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine (2007); Chancellor's Outstanding Student, University of Pittsburgh (2006); New Investigator Recognition Award (NIRA) Candidate at the 51st Annual ORS Meeting (2005); and Outstanding Teaching Assistant Awards, University of Pittsburgh, Bioengineering Department (2005).

Hongshuai Li  MD, PhD

Dr. Li is an Orthopaedics Post-doc Research Fellow working in the Stem Cell Research Center performing basic and translational research in the area of bone and cartilage regeneration.  His major area of study in the lab, currently, is the use of Muscle derived stem cell (MDSC) and platelet rich plasma (PRP) to improve the healing of bone and cartilage.  He will be involved with creating bone and cartilage related animal models. He will also be involved with cell preparation, evaluation of different fractions of cells obtained from mouse skeletal muscle to identify the cell population with the greatest chondrogenic or osteogenic potential, tissue processing, data acquisition, and data analysis. All the knowledge and techniques gained from his work with animals will be applied to his future research with human skeletal cells.

Research Administrator
412.648.3014

Dr. Lu is responsible for the isolation, identification and characterization of muscle-derived stem cells (MDSCs). The researchers at the SCRC have already tried to isolate MDSCs by modifying a method called the preplate technique to obtain clonal colonies from mice of different ages and gender. Recently we have identified and isolated MDSC clones having different, unique characteristics.

My main project entails theregeneration of functional muscle by MDSC transplantation. It has been demonstrated that the use of muscle-derived stem cells (MDSCs) can circumvent hurdles facing myoblast transfer therapy, consequently improve the efficiency of muscle regeneration and dystrophin delivery to dystrophic muscle. We have transplanted MDSCs into the gastrocnemius muscle of younger MDX mice in an attempt to improve muscle force. Furthermore, we are using NGF stimulated and NGF transduced MDSCs since we have recently observed that ex vivo NGF-stimulated MDSCs can significantly promote muscle regeneration upon injection. These studies are still underway.

Xiadong Mu, Ph.D.
Researcher
412.648.3326

My research is related with skeletal muscle regeneration and the administration of muscle derived stem cells for regenerative medicine. I have been studying whether multipotent stem cells can be induced by dedifferentiation/reprogramming of differentiated myoblasts or skin cells and whether the induced stem cells can contribute to skeletal muscle regeneration in mammals. I am also investigating the mechanisms of various protein factors in influencing the effect of myoblast/stem cell transplantation and preventing fibrosis formation in injured or diseased skeletal muscle. The main factors I am studying in my projects include: TGF-βs, Msx-1, Matrix Metalloproteinases (MMPs), and the insulin-like hormone relaxin.

I got my master's degree from Beijing University (China) and Ph.D. degree from University of Maryland School of Medicine.

Nicholas Oyster, B.S.

412-648-3311

Education:

Undergraduate: University of Rochester, 1999-2004

Biomedical Engineering

Graduate: University of Pittsburgh, 2008-present

Bioengineering master’s student

Research:

My early research focused on the epithelial sodium channel (ENaC) and its regulation by AMP-activated kinase (AMPK).  However, my interests returned to biomedical research, specifically, tissue engineering thus I joined the Plastic Surgery Research Lab in 2008. There, I studied the use of adipose-tissue-derived stem cells (ASCs) in tissue repair and regeneration. I joined the Stem Cell Research Center in November 2010 to begin my work studying muscle-derived stem cells. My research here focuses on the use of stem cells for tissue repair and/or regeneration. I am currently studying the effects stem cell therapy has on muscle repair following muscle injury, specifically, injuries due to the compression of tissue during compartment syndrome.  Another study I am working on is characterizing platelet-rich plasma (PRP) and determining what effects PRP has on stem cell proliferation and differentiation. PRP offers an exciting possibility of using autologous growth factors to treat disease and repair tissue damage.

Alessandra Pisciotta, M.S.
PhD student
412-648-2798

Education:

Second level degree in Biology at University of Modena and Reggio Emilia

Research Project:

Ms. Pisciotta is a PhD student at University of Bologna and is currently conducting her research at the Stem Cell Research Center, University of Pittsburgh. Her research interests have been focused on the in vivo implantation of stem cell-bioscaffold constructs realized with Human Amniotic Fluid and Dental Pulp Stem Cells, pre-differentiated towards osteogenic lineage, in order to restore critical size bone defects. Recently Alessandra has been evaluating the results of her last experiment of osteogenic pre-differentiation of hDPSCs in a culture medium supplemented with human serum (instead of foetal calf serum), and in vivo implantation in animal model. Her research activity in the SCRC is focused on evaluating the in vitro and in vivo myogenic potential of hDPSCs and hAFSCs, in order to investigate their ability to regenerate muscle tissue in a DMD animal model.

Minakshi Poddar, M.A., M.Sc.
412-624-6962

Jonathan Proto

Graduate Student

Johannes Schneppendahl, MD

Visiting Researcher/ Orthopaedic Surgeon

412-648-2798

Education:

MD-PhD. University of Münster, Germany.

Research Interests:

Dr. Schneppendahl is a Medical Doctor who works as a Research Fellow at SCRC. After finishing Medical School and finishing his doctoral thesis at the University of Münster, Germany he started his residency in Orthopaedic Surgery in Düsseldorf, Germany. His research interests include biomechanics and tissue regeneration. In addition to his articles published already, he conducted projects on bone regeneration utilizing autologous stem cells, platelet rich plasma (PRP) and Hyperbaric Oxygenation (HBO) at the University of Düsseldorf before he became a member of the SCRC team. Dr. Schneppendahl is performing basic and translational research in the area of nerve and rotator cuff regeneration, as well as the influences of platelet rich plasma on tissue regeneration. He is also training in hand surgery with Dr. Kaufman at the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, University of Pittsburgh.

Jihee Sohn

Graduate Student

412-648-2798

Jihee’s main project involves isolating mouse Adipose derived stem cells (ADSCs) from young and old Wild type (Wt), mdx, and dKO mice and characterizing them by examining their proliferation and multi-lineage differentiation capacities in vitro. Her projects also involve investigating origin of cells responsible for ectopic fat cell formation in skeletal muscle in DMD and examining mechanism of increased adipogenesis in skeletal muscle.  Finally, she is also investigating means to rescue functions of muscle derived stem cells (MDSCs) from aged and dystrophic mice by co-culturing defective MDSCs obtained from dKO with healthy adipose derived stem cells obtained from young, unaffected mice. 

Mrs. Ying Tang is a Technician at the Division of Molecular Therapeutics, SCRC and is responsible for the daily research activities of many different lab projects which are focused around vector creation for gene therapy uses. For more information, please check the page of Dr. Bing Wang.

Ms. Tebbets is a Senior Technician in the SCRC, and is involved in many different lab projects. She is also the lab's safety representative, and contributes tremendously to the daily running of the laboratory.

Seth Thompson

Research Technician

412.648.3069

In past years, Dr. Wang has been engaged in projects that concentrated on gene therapy for neuromuscular disorders, specifically Duchenne and Limb Girdle muscular dystrophies, using AAV viral vectors as gene vehicles. He directs the Molecular Therapeutics Lab.