Realizing the developmental and therapeutic potential of pluripotent human embryonic stem cell (hESC) derivatives has been hindered by the inefficiency and instability of generating clinically-relevant functional cells from pluripotent cells through conventional uncontrollable and incomplete multi-lineage differentiation.

Large-scale profiling of developmental regulators and histone modifications by genome-wide approaches have provided powerful genome-wide, high-throughput, and high resolution techniques that lead to great advances in our understanding of the global phenomena of human developmental processes. However, without a practical strategy to convert pluripotent cells direct into a specific lineage, previous studies are limited ...more »

Critical Challenge

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a major health problem and the leading cause of death in the Western world. Currently, there is no treatment option or compound drug of molecular entity that can change the prognosis of CVD.

In the human failing heart, it is the systems biology that ultimately fails: electrical, mechanical, and chemical perturbations in their function do not manifest in isolation, but critically impact on each other in health and disease. Investigation of human myocardium, unlike inbred rodent models, is challenging since no two humans are identical. There is a need for the collection and assessment of clinical patient data, ...more »

Critical Challenge

to date, the existing markets lack a clinically-suitable human cardiomyocyte source with adequate myocardium regenerative potential, which has been the major setback in developing safe and effective cell-based therapies for regenerating the damaged human heart in cardiovascular disease.

For successful pharmaceutical development of cardiac stem cell therapy, the human cardiac stem cell therapy product must meet certain commercial criteria in plasticity, specificity, and stability before entry into clinical trials.

Critical Challenge