Robert Lanza, M.D. is currently Head of Astellas Global Regenerative Medicine, Chief Scientific Officer of AIRM and an adjunct professor at the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine. Time magazine recognized him as one of the “100 Most Influential People in the World,” and Prospect magazine named him one of the Top 50 “World Thinkers.” His research focuses on stem cells and their potential to provide therapies for some of the world's most deadly and debilitating conditions. He has hundreds of scientific publications and over 30 books, including definitive references in the fields of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. He is a former Fulbright Scholar, and studied with polio-pioneer Jonas Salk and Nobel laureates Gerald Edelman and Rodney Porter. He also worked closely (and co-authored a series of papers) with psychologist BF Skinner and heart transplant-pioneer Christiaan Barnard. Dr. Lanza received his undergraduate and medical degrees from the University of Pennsylvania, where he was both a University Scholar and Benjamin Franklin Scholar. Lanza was part of the team that cloned the world’s first human embryo, the first endangered species, and published the first-ever reports of pluripotent stem cell use in humans.

• Section 1: Organ-Derived Stem Cells1. Neural Stem Cell Isolation and Characterization Rodney L. Rietze and Brent A. Reynolds2. Neural Stem Cells and Their Manipulation Evan Snyder3. Retinal Stem Cells Thomas A. Reh and Andy J. Fischer4. Dental Pulp Stem Cells He Liu, Stan Gronthos and Songtao Shi5. Spermatogonial Stem Cells Jon M. Oatley and Ralph L. Brinster6. Stem Cells in the Lung Xiaoming Liu, Ryan R. Driskell and John F. Engelhardt7. Pancreatic Cells and Their Progenitors Seth J. Salpeter and Yuval Dor8. Pluripotent Stem Cells from Germ Cells Candace L. Kerr, Michael J. Shamblott and John D. Gearhart9. Amniotic Fluid and Placental Stem Cells Dawn M. Delo, Paolo De Coppi, Georg Bartsch, Jr. and Anthony Atala10. Cord Blood Stem and Progenitor Cells Mervin C. Yoder11. Purification of Hematopoietic Stem Cells Using the Side Population K.K. Lin and Margaret A. Goodell12. Microarray Analysis of Stem Cells and Differentiation Howard Y. Chang13. Tissue Engineering Using Adult Stem Cells Daniel Eberli 14. Mesenchymal Stem Cells and Tissue Engineering Nicholas W. Marion and Jeremy J. MaoSection II: Embryonic Stem Cells15. Murine Embryonic Stem Cells Andras Nagy and Kristina Vintersten16. Human Embryo Culture Amparo Mercader, Diana Valbuena and Carlos Simón17. Human Embryonic Stem Cells Douglas Melton18. Characterization and Evaluation of Human Embryonic Stem Cells Chunhui Xu19. Feeder-Free Culture of Human Embryonic Stem Cells Michal Amit and Joseph Itskovitz-Eldor20. Neural Stem Cells, Neurons, and Glia Steven M. Pollard, Alex Benchoua and Sally Lowell21. Hematopoietic Cells Malcolm A.S. Moore, Jae-Hung Shieh and Gabsang Lee22. Cardiomyocytes Xiangzhong Yang, Xi-Min Guo, Chang-Yong Wang and X. Cindy Tian23. Insulin-Producing Cells Insa S. Schroeder, Gabriela Kania, Przemyslaw Blyszczuk 24. Transgene Expression and RNA Interference in Embryonic Stem Cells Holm Zaehres and George Q. Daley25. Lentiviral Vector-Mediated Gene Delivery into Human Embryonic Stem Cells Michal Gropp and Benjamin Reubinoff26. Engineering Embryonic Stem Cells with Recombinase Systems Frank Schnütgen, A. Francis Stewart, Harald von Melchner and Konstantinos Anastassiadis27. Tissue Engineering Using Embryonic Stem Cells Shahar Cohen, Lucy Leshanski and Joseph Itskovitz-Eldor