Seminar

Francesca Spagnoli is a developmental and stem cell biologist with a record of highly productive research in mechanisms regulating cell identity and plasticity of key metabolic organs, such as the liver and the pancreas. After graduating from Medical School in Rome, she received her Ph.D. in Genetics from the Pasteur Institute in Paris, France. She then did her postdoc at The Rockefeller University, New York, USA. In 2008, Spagnoli established her research group at the Max Delbrück Center in Berlin, Germany, where she initiated new lines of investigation on the control of pancreatic cell identity and lineage reprogramming strategies. She has subsequently become a Professor of Regenerative Medicine at King's College London and relocated her lab. in the Centre for Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine. Spagnoli has been the recipient of prestigious grants, including an ERC Starting grant and ERC Proof-of-Concept grant, Wellcome Trust Investigator Award. She has been the Coordinator of the H2020 EIC Fet-Open consortium called ‘Pan3DP’ on pancreas bioengineering. She is currently leading a large research programme funded by Steve Morgan Foundation/JDRF/Diabetes UK in developing innovative bioengineering solution for diabetes cell therapy. Since 2018, she has been the Director of the Wellcome Trust 4-Year PhD Programme “Advanced Therapies for Regenerative Medicine” at King’s College London, UK.