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Christopher Fasano, Ph.D.

Christopher Fasano, Ph.D.

Dr. Fasano  is a principal investigator and director of research & development at THE Neural Stem Cell Institute.   Dr. Fasano received his Ph.D. from Albany Medical College in 2007 studying mouse neural stem cells. His work focused on understanding the molecular mechanisms of neural stem cell self-renewal; the unique property of stem cells that allows them to make more of themselves. His studies as a graduate student led to two first author publications, one in inaugural issue of Cell Stem Cell and one in Genes and Development. Dr. Fasano continued his stem cell studies during a post-doctoral fellowship under Lorenz Studer where he used human embryonic stem cells as a tool to study neural development. His work here led to a novel discovery describing for the first time the derivation of the floor plate; the developmental origin of midbrain dopamine neurons in mouse published in Cell Stem Cell. This discovery led to subsequent work describing the first ever generation of authentic midbrain dopamine neurons that could ameliorate Parkinson’s disease symptoms in rodents and monkeys. In addition to this, Dr. Fasano work as a post-doc led to 4 additional publications, and a fellowship from NYSCF in just 2 years.

In addition to his role as principal investigator, Dr. Fasano also directs the NeuraCell core facility at THE Neural Stem Cell Institute.    Dr. Fasano is also the Chief Operating Officer, and co-Founder of Stem Culture, LLC, a biotechnology company that specializes in manufacturing sustained release growth factors.  Dr. Fasano hosts a bi-weekly PodCast on iTUNES called THE Stem Cell Podcast, contributes weekly to a Stem Cell Blog, and founded and chairs a stem cell meeting, The Next Gen Stem Cell Conference. Christopher is originally from Suffern, NY, and now resides in Glenmont, NY.  For more information on Dr. Fasano’s research please go to www.neuralsci.org.