Our major interest is to use stem cell technology to treat various cardiovascular diseases.
Stem Cells
• We develop and use different stem or progenitor cells for cardiovascular repair
1) Pluripotent stem cells
o Induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells
o Embryonic stem (ES) cells
2) Bone marrow or peripheral-derived stem or progenitor cells
o Endothelial stem cells
o Mesenchymal stem cells
o Bone marrow-derived multipotent stem cells (BMSC)
o CD31+ cells
o Hematopoietic stem cells
• Target diseases
o Cardiac diseases: Myocardial infarction, chronic heart failure
o Peripheral vascular disease; PAOD (peripheral artery obstructive disease) etc
o Diabetic neuropathy
o Lymphedema
o Wound (wound healing)
• We investigate in vitro differentiation of pluripotent stem cells
o Differentiate into endothelial cells, cardiomyocytes, lymphatic vessels
o Therapeutic potential in the target diseases
• We recently started to combine technologies of biomaterial and stem cells for cardiac repair
Mechanistically, we are interested in angiogenesis, lymphangiogenesis, and cardiomyogenesis
Diabetes related research
• We work on the role of angiogenesis in diabetic complications such as heart failure, PAOD and diabetic neuropathy
• We investigate functional defects of stem or progenitor cells in diabetes
o Currently we are studying ROS-related targets
• We are developing a strategy to rescue this impairment
Research achievements
· First demonstration of successful gene therapy with VEGF-C for treating secondary lymphedema (Yoon et al., J Clin Invest, 2003)
· Role of VEGF and EPCs in the development of diabetic cardiomyopathy (Yoon et al., Circulation, 2005)
· First demonstration of side effects (calcification) of infarcted myocardium treated with unfractionated bone marrow cells (Yoon et al., Circulation, 2004)
· Development of novel bone marrow-derived stem cells and demonstration of successful therapeutic effects in myocardial infarction (Yoon et al., J Clin Invest, 2005)
· Role of host cells in therapeutic effects of adult stem cells (Cho et al., J Exp Med, 2007)
· First demonstration of bone marrow-derived EPCs engraft diabetic nerves and improve nerve function in diabetic neuropathy. First demonstration of robust long-term (more than 12 weeks) of adult progenitor cells in diabetic tissues (Jeong et al., Circulation, 2009)
· First demonstration that CD31+ cells derived from bone marrow and peripheral blood have robust neovascularization effects and highly effective for treating cardiovascular disease (Kim et al., J Am Coll Cardiol, 2010; Kim et al., Circ Res, 2010)
