PROFESSOR COLIN P. MCGUCKIN

The Daily Mail article British scientists grow human liver in a laboratory said

British scientists have grown the world's first artificial liver from stem cells in a breakthrough that will one day provide entire organs for transplant.

Colin McGuckin is professor of regenerative medicine at Newcastle University. He said: "We take the stem cells from the umbilical cord blood and make small mini-livers.

"We then give them to pharmaceutical companies and they can use them to test new drugs on.

"It could prevent the situation that happened earlier this year when those six patients had a massive reaction to the drugs they were testing."

Professor Colin P. McGuckin, DPhil, BSc(Hons), PGCTLHE, EurProBiol, CBiol, MIBiol, MRSC is Professor of Regenerative Medicine at University of Newcastle upon Tyne, Visiting Professor at Rice University, Visiting Professor at University of Texas Medical Branch, Honorary Professor at IPCT University, Brazil, and Honorary Professor at Kingston University London.

After finishing his PhD (DPhil) on leukaemia research in 1991 (Biomedical Sciences Research Centre, University of Ulster), Colin completed a postdoctoral position at St George's Hospital Medical School Dept of Haematology. There he worked on Chronic Anaemia's & Stem Cell Disorders. In 1996 he became Senior Lecturer in Biomedical Sciences at Kingston University, and "Reader" in 2001. In 1999, he founded and became Director of the Stem Cell Therapy Laboratory specializing in Stem Cell Research, Tissue Engineering and regenerative medicine. This group is the world's first to characterize a harvesting and culture strategy to produce embryonic-like stem cells from Umbilical Cord Blood. These stem cells have the benefit of not coming from embryological sources and are hence an ethically sound and viable alternative for tissue engineering. His research collaborates internationally and with industry.

Colin is also a freelance journalist working with TV, radio and print media and believes in promoting medical and scientific research understanding to the public. He is a UK Millennium Fellow & Media Fellow promoting science and medicine to the public. In 2005 he was appointed the first Professor of Regenerative Medicine at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, leading a clinical research program to take adult stem cells through to patients.

He coauthored Colocalization Analysis of Sialomucins CD34 and CD164, Characterization of a Lineage-Negative Stem-Progenitor Cell Population Optimized for Ex Vivo Expansion and Enriched for LTC-IC, Production of stem cells with embryonic characteristics from human umbilical cord blood, Thrombopoietin, flt3-ligand and c-kit-ligand modulate HOX gene expression in expanding cord blood CD133+ cells, A novel approach to investigating the erythroid lineage, using both receptor analysis and haemoglobin detection, and Haemopoietic and neuroglial progenitors are promoted during cord blood ex vivo expansion.

Colin is on the editorial board of 2 international journals, international reviewer [Eg. European Commission], and an advisor to several medical and science organizations. He has been invited to speak internationally, including the European Parliament and at the Vatican, Rome. Print bio!