The Berkeley Stem Cell Center is a multidisciplinary group of scientists, physicians, and humanities and legal scholars committed to the study of this new technology. Principal investigators are drawn from campus departments including Bioengineering, Chemical Engineering, Chemistry, Molecular and Cell Biology, Rhetoric, and Anthropology, and from the Bancroft Library, Boalt Hall School of Law, Children's Hospital Oakland Research Institute, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Major scientific efforts of the Center include the differentiation of stem cells into blood, nerve and muscle cells, and the effects of aging or engineered extracellular environments on these processes. Studies of differentiation of cord blood stem cells will augment the ongoing cord blood transplantation program at Children's Hospital Oakland. Humanities and legal studies include issues of informed consent and intellectual property, the history of Proposition 71 and its implications for the people of California. The Berkeley Stem Cell Center was awarded a training grant from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, to support fellows in basic science, medicine, law and the humanities.
News
CHORI Summer Student Research Program - March 2009
The objective of the CHORI Summer Student Research Program is to provide short-term training opportunities for undergraduate, medical and health professional students.
Dr. Sanjay Kumar is awarded the NIH Director's New Innovator Award – September 2008
Dr. Sanjay Kumar, Assistant Professor of Bioengineering and Berkeley Stem Cell Center faculty affiliate, is one of 31 recipients of the New Innovator Award, announced Monday, Sept. 22 by NIH Director Elias A. Zerhouni. Dr. Kumar will receive $1.5 million over the next five years to support his research program, which combines approaches from biophysics, systems biology and oncology to study how cells sense and process mechanical forces in human health and disease. This is the second consecutive year that a Berkeley Stem Cell Center faculty affiliate has received an NIH New Innovator Award. Dr. Michael Rape was awarded this honor in 2007.