Research Projects

Current Projects

Skeletal muscle development from hESCs

• Identification and isolation of striated myogenic precursors
• In vitro terminal differentiation of the precursors into mature myocytes
• Transplantation of ESC-derived muscle cells into animal models of myopathies

Reconstructing the human neural crest in vitro from hESCs

• Identification and isolation of neural crest precursors (cephalic and truncal)
• In vitro differentiation into specific neural crest derivatives
• Role of microRNAs in the development of the neural crest

Differentiation of hESCs into retinal cells

• Optimization of culture conditions for forebrain development
• Role of growth factors in inducing retinal cell differentiation
• Differentiation of hESCs into specialised retina cell subtypes (RPE, neural retina)
• Transplantation of the cell subtypes into an animal model of eye disease

Use of mESC mutants to elucidate the function of genes involved in neural development

• Role of SCL/Tal1 during neural development in mESCs
• Effect of Wnt-1 overexpression in mESCs differentiation

Endoderm specification in mESCs

• Definitive vs extraembryonic endoderm