For over twenty years, Dr. Dunbar’s laboratory has had the privilege of utilizing a rhesus macaque transplantation model. Her facility is one of only a handful worldwide able to successfully support non-human primates through stem cell transplantation. This model provides unique and highly relevant insights into hematopoiesis and has resulted in successful optimization of gene and cell therapy approaches later translated successfully into human clinical trials. Her studies also encompass informative in vitro, murine, and human xenograft models.
Dr. Dunbar and her colleagues have mapped the number, frequency, and output of individual stem and progenitor cells over time, and analyzed the impact of clinically relevant interventions such as cytokines on stem cell dynamics in vivo. They have provided insights into the processes of hematopoietic stem cell mobilization and homing, utilizing molecular and high-resolution novel imaging techniques able to track the output of individual stem cell clones, and have described the biochemistry and functional importance of a polarized membrane domain in these processes.
#Hematopoietic stem cell #Hematopoiesis #non-human primate
