Dave Hay Research Group
Liver Tissue Development and Engineering
The liver plays a vital role in human health, including the detoxification of foreign substances. We use stem cells to grow liver tissue in the laboratory. The stem cells we use are called human embryonic stem cells and induced pluripotent stem cells. The attraction of using these cell populations is their indefinite growth in the lab and their ability to form all the cells found in the human body. We have developed reliable methods for building human liver tissue. Encouragingly, it behaves in a similar way to the liver found in the human body. We believe our liver tissue has an important part to play in improving human drug development and repurposing; modelling human disease and in the future may provide an alternative source of human tissue to treat failing human liver function.
Professor David Hay
Group Leader
Contact details
- Work: 0131 651 9500
- Email: david.hay@ed.ac.uk
- Web: Personal Profile
Aims and areas of interest
Our aims are:
- To develop informative human liver models produced from pluripotent stem cells
- To develop implantable human liver tissue derived from pluripotent stem cells
- To develop synthetic and natural materials for tissue engineering purposes
Professor Hay recently wrote an article on careers in science for Futurum Careers.
In the news
Group Members
Victoria Gadd (Postdoc)
Sharmin Alhaque (PhD Student shared with Brunel University)
Alvile Kasarinaite (PhD Student)
Angus Marks (PhD Student shared with Chemistry)
Matthew Sinton (PhD Student shared with BHF CVR)
Gregor Skeldon (PhD Student shared with Strathclyde University)
Mojca Zelnikar (Research Assistant)
Funders
Collaborators
We work collaboratively with a number of groups in Edinburgh:
Stuart Forbes, Mark Bradley, Anthony Callanan, Mandy Drake, Colin Campbell, Carsten Hansen, Anura Rambukana and Bruno Peault
We collaborate with other researchers in the UK and overseas:
- Fiona Watt, Anil Dhawan, and Giovanna Lombardi, King’s College London
- Jan Hengstler, University of Dortmund
- Lijian Hui, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences
- Ron Hay, University of Dundee
- Cliona O’Farrelly, Trinity College Dublin
- Jo Mountford, University of Glasgow
- Michael Themis, Brunel University
- Will Shu, Strathclyde University
Our industry partners include:
- Ruchi Sharma, Stemnovate
- Kristian Tryggvason, Biolamina
- Dominic Williams, Astra Zeneca
- Charis Segeritz-Walko – StemCell Technologies
