News & Events: Cellular Reprogramming

In the medieval ages, alchemists dedicated their lifetimes searching for the formula that would transform ordinary metals into gold. In our bodies, several cases of "cellular alchemy" have been reported. Known as transdifferentiation, this process consists of one specialized cell type transmuting into a different one.  Until now, this phenomenon had only been observed in the context of replenishing cells lost from pre-existing structures. Now, UCSF researchers, led by Holger Willenbring, MD, PhD, professor of surgery and associate director of the Liver Center at UCSF, and a member of the Eli [...]

Holger Willenbring, MD, PhD is the receipient of a Discovery Stage Research Project award from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM). The project "Preclinical development of AAV vector-mediated in vivo hepatic reprogramming of myofibroblasts as a therapy for liver fibrosis" was approved for $1.6M in funding through the Discovery Quest Awards Program, which promotes the discovery of promising new stem cell-based technologies that could be translated to enable broad use and, ultimately, improve patient care. Dr. Willenbring's project aims to develop a therapy for liver [...]

UCSF News reports on the research of the Willenbring Lab and others demonstrating in mice that healthy new liver cells could be generated within the organ itself, thus making engraftment unnecessary. The article noted that the very cells that drive liver disease were converted, thereby reducing liver damage and improving liver function simultaneously. The study was recently reported on in a paper published by the journal Cell Stem Cell.  Advances in stem cell research have made it possible to convert patients' skin cells into heart cells, kidney cells, liver cells and more in the lab dish, [...]

A recent paper in the journal Nature, reported by UCSF News by a research team including Associate Professor Holger Willenbring, M.D., Ph.D. and Senior Resident Jack Harbell, M.D., a former postdoctoral fellow in the Willenbring lab, reports a new method of cellular reprogramming with potential for treating liver disease: The power of regenerative medicine now allows scientists to transform skin cells into cells that closely resemble heart cells, pancreas cells and even neurons. However, a method to generate cells that are fully mature – a crucial prerequisite for life-saving therapies – [...]

UCSF scientists have received two large grants from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine to refine their human embryonic stem cell-based strategies for treating neurological diseases and liver failure. A team led by Mark Zern, MD, of the University of California, Davis, and including co-principal investigator Holger Willenbring, M.D., (pictured left) Assistant Professor of Surgery in the Division of Transplant Surgery at UCSF will use their $5 million grant to develop therapeutically effective liver cells, or hepatocytes, from human embryonic stem cells. According to [...]