Characterization of Hematopoietic Cell Cultures

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This proposal is to study the critical medical area of ex-vivo expansion of bone-marrow stem cells into mature blood cells useful for a variety of therapies, e.g., neutrophils to fight infection, platelets for clotting, etc. The research team, which includes bioprocess engineers, a computer-modeling expert, and a physician expert in bone-marrow transplantation, will attempt to employ metabolic assays (cell-signatures) to characterize these complex cultures. The group has recently developed a mathematical model that can discriminate between hypotheses effecting red blood cell cultures and plans to extend this model to granulocytes and megakeryocyte lineages. In order to achieve these goals, the group will extensively characterize cell proliferation, progenitor cell content, differentiation markers (e.g., surface antigen expression), and cell metabolism.