Stem Cell Experts

April 12, 2007

Los Angeles- Stem cell research continues to be a volatile legislative issue as the White House recently announced that President Bush will again veto a bill to subsidize stem cell research using human embryos, but would sign an alternative that permits public funding for studies on embryos incapable of developing into fetuses. Experts at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California are available to offer their insight and opinions on the current state of stem cell research and the outlook for its future. They include:

Martin Pera, Ph.D., professor and director of the USC Center for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine at the Keck School of Medicine. His former laboratory at Monash University in Australia was the second in the world to isolate embryonic stem cells from the human blastocyst and the first to describe their differentiation into somatic cells in vitro. He has provided extensive advice to state, national and international regulatory authorities on the scientific background to human embryonic stem cell research, and is a founding member of the Hinxton Group and serves on the Steering Group of the International Stem Cell Initiative.

Gay Crooks, M.D. is an associate professor of pediatrics at USC and the director of the Childrens Hospital Los Angeles Stem Cell Project. Dr. Crooks has been studying human stem cells in the bone marrow and umbilical cord blood for 14 years. In 2004, she was made a Stohlman Scholar of the Leukemia Lymphoma Society for her work with human hematopoietic (blood-forming) stem and progenitor cells. Her research team’s achievements include the first isolation of the primitive cells in cord blood responsible for producing the immune system (Common Lymphoid Progenitors) and the development of a technique to image and track human hematopoietic stem cells after transplantation.

Leslie Weiner, M.D., professor of microbiology and neurology and holder of the Richard Angus Grant Sr. Chair in Neurology at the Keck School of Medicine. Dr. Weiner is a microbiologist specializing in stem cell research and viral and immunologic diseases of the nervous system, especially multiple sclerosis. He is a member of the International Society for Stem Cell Research and of the Connecticut Stem Cell Research Peer Review Committee.