Page 13 - Gates-AnnualReport-2017

Charles C. Gates embodied the pioneer spirit, but he was also fond of saying that the most effective way toward progress in a venture was to find the best people and move forward together. At the Gates Center for Regenerative Medicine, 2017 was the year that spirit of collaboration greatly expanded our reach, our research, our talent and our support.
Gates Center Advisory Board Member Wag Schorr, M.D., is a superb example. Much like Charlie Gates, Wag has a vision for the future expansion of the center and the campus, as well as an indefatigable commitment to help drive and support our research to treat and potentially cure patients, such as his granddaughter, Calla (see page 15). We nominated Wag as the 2017 recipient of the Florence Rena Sabin Award, for his leadership and example in the kind of collaboration that is helping the center advance rapidly into the future.
Collaborative highlights of the year included welcoming Valeria Canto-Soler, Ph.D., to campus in July, whose recruitment was made possible through the center’s collaboration with the Department of Ophthalmology and benefactors including the Gates Frontiers Fund. With great pride and appreciation, Valeria proceeded to set up her pristine lab to serve the campus, help acclimate her colleagues who followed her from Johns Hopkins, and plan for the future. In the fall, we made our own plans to co-host a unique two-day conference with Colorado State University’s College of Veterinary Medicine in October 2018. Called Zoobiquity Colorado: Connecting Human and Animal Health through Regenerative Medicine, the conference will highlight the laboratory and clinical research of human and veterinary investigators, and foster ongoing and future collaborations amongst our participants. Lastly, our partnership with Stanford and Columbia, the Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB) iPS Cell Consortium, formed to collectively fight the rare and debilitating genetic skin blistering disease, was rewarded with an additional funder and private and public funding, including one of the first of a very few grants awarded nationwide through the 21st Century Cures Act.
In the area of research, we established a new Stem Cell Biobank and Disease Modeling Core that is spurring research into a variety of new areas through philanthropic partnership. Utilizing Ganna Bilousova, Ph.D. and Igor Kogut, Ph.D.’s novel technology as a platform, this core uses iPSCs as tools to understand the underlying basis of diseases—particularly those that affect tissues that cannot be easily biopsied, such as the brain. We also celebrated Gates Center members who received grant awards from the National Institutes of Health and other sponsors, some of whom reminded us of the critical weight they gave to their collaborations and to early-stage support from the Gates Center, the Gates Grubstake Fund and private philanthropy. (see Grant Awards on page 26) In this report, we have listed a selection of members whose research has led to published articles or honors by way of awards, mention or membership (see Publications and Honors on page 21). We also have updates on those whose distinguished research has led to receipt of Gates Grubstake Awards over the last four years, and the establishment of the Startup Toolbox to help members through key steps in moving
Gates Center for Regenerative Medicine 13