Lorenz Studer
| Lorenz Studer | |
|---|---|
| Born | March 5, 1966 (Age 49) Solothurn, Switzerland |
| Residence | United States |
| Nationality | Swiss |
| Fields |
Developmental biology Stem Cells Neuroscience Parkinson's Disease |
| Institutions |
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Sloan Kettering Institute Weill Cornell Medical College (Affiliated) |
| Alma mater |
University of Fribourg (1987) |
| Known for |
Stem cell Parkinson’s Disease research |
| Notable awards |
MacArthur Fellowship (2015) Annemarie Opprecht Parkinson Award (2012) Louise and Allston Boyer Young Investigator in Basic Research, MSKCC (2005) |
University of Fribourg (1987)
Lorenz Studer (born March 6, 1966) is the Founder and Director of the Center for Stem Cell Biology at Memorial-Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City. He is a developmental biologist and neuroscientist who is pioneering the generation of midbrain dopamine neurons for transplantation and clinical applications. Currently, he is a member of the Developmental Biology Program and Department of Neurosurgery at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and a Professor of Neuroscience at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City, NY.
In 2015, he was named a recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship (also known as the "Genius Grant") for his innovative work on stem cell and Parkinson’s disease research.
In 1998, while at the lab of Ronald D. McKay at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, he developed techniques that facilitate the generation of dopamine cells, the primary cell type affected in Parkinson's disease in vitro from dividing precursor cells. He successfully demonstrated that upon transplantation, these newly developed dopaminergic neurons can improve clinical symptoms in Parkinsonian rat models.
Over the years, he has developed a variety of novel cell engineering strategies for developing specific neural cell types in culture. Most notably, he has devised protocols for the transition (or "differentiation") of human pluripotent stem cells into neural and neural crest tissues and for the generation of functional dopaminergic neurons in large-scale quantities. In long-term studies, Studer demonstrated that these cells are non-tumorigenic, can integrate into the host brain and may serve as functional replacements for the substantia nigra dopamine neurons which die in Parkinson's disease.
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