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Marcel Daadi, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Department of Cell Systems and Anatomy

Leader of Regenerative Medicine & Aging Unit

Dr. Marcel Daadi is an expert in neural stem cell biology and regulated translational research, especially in stem cell therapeutic applications for Parkinson’s disease and brain injuries. He discovered growth and differentiation conditions to direct human neural stem cells toward the dopaminergic lineage. This work produced two hallmark studies, both of scientific importance and therapeutic application for Parkinson’s disease.

In an industrial setting (NeuroSpheres Ltd. and Layton Biosciences Inc.), he developed therapeutic neural stem cell lines for clinical use in stroke, Parkinson’s disease and other diseases and injuries. He is involved in the development of the world’s first cryopreserved neural product manufactured under current Good Manufacturing Practices and transplanted into patients afflicted with stroke at Layton Biosciences Inc., Sunnyvale CA.

At the University of California San Francisco, he was involved in pivotal Investigational New Drug-enabling gene therapy nonhuman primate studies that allowed Avigen, Inc. to conduct clinical trials for treating patients with Parkinson’s disease. At Stanford University, he started and led the human embryonic stem cell program focused on developing therapeutic stem cell lines for treating ischemic stroke. He also discovered and patented a novel methods for engineering neural stem cells from human pluripotent stem cells that is currently in development for treating patients with Parkinson's disease, traumatic brain injury and stroke.

Daadi's laboratory is devoted to the modeling and understanding of neurological disorders and to discovery and development of therapeutics including small molecules, cell and gene therapy for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease in particular. Our laboratory uses a wide array of neurobehavioral tests, multimodal imaging, induced pluripotent stem cell-based models, in vitro cell assays, single cell multi-omics and immunohistopathological approaches to investigate cellular diversity, aging and neural networks neuroplasticity in health and diseases

Dr. Daadi's current research is centered on the following areas:

1. Development of technologies to establish pluripotent stem cells, isolate self-renewable multipotent NSCs and generate specific neuronal lineages, such as dopaminergic neurons for treating Parkinson’s disease.

2. Reprogramming and genome-editing technologies to model neurological disorders in vitro and to understand mechanisms mediating disease development and degenerative processes following injury or disease.

3. Developing therapeutic stem cell lines for clinical use.

4. Preclinical development using nonhuman primates models of a variety of diseases and applying cell delivery and multimodal molecular imaging approaches for monitor the safety and efficacy.

5. Genetic engineering of NSCs to investigate the role of optogenetics on their fate after grafting. These studies will help determine the mechanisms mediating stem cell graft–host interactions in enhancing neuro-regeneration and restoring function.

Results from our studies are the foundation of translational research aimed at repairing diseased or injured brain through transplantation of highly purified NSCs or stimulation of endogenous repair mechanisms.