Megan McCain has always enjoyed building and fixing things. She also has long been fascinated by cells in the human body and how they work together to achieve important tasks, like how …

A pair of young scientists picked up a piece of driftwood and thoughtfully traced a series of letters in the wet sand of Ventura Beach. The word “microglia”—referring to the immune cells …

In 1976, the United States celebrated its’ 200th birthday, and USC’s department of biomedical engineering was born. Nearly 50 years later, that department has a name: the Alfred E. Mann Department of …

Neuromuscular diseases are debilitating and mostly incurable, affecting 160 out of every 100,000 people worldwide. Disorders such as ALS and multiple sclerosis impact the function of muscles, causing muscle wastage and loss …

Megan McCain has always liked using her hands to create things, ranging from art projects to human heart cells that grow on silicon chips. “I’ve always loved building things and doing crafts, …

Now that Justin Ichida and Dion Dickman are both tenured professors at USC, they no longer have to worry about who was the coolest kid in their elementary schools back in Honolulu. …

The human brain is an incredibly complex organ to study in its living tissue form. Researchers cannot experiment on human tissue directly, and animal models are often too different to human physiology …

A record six assistant professors at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering — Megan McCain, Department of Biomedical Engineering; Mitul Luhar, Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engienering; Aleksandra Korolova and Haipeng Luo, Department of Computer Science; and Daniel …

Cut a zebrafish’s heart and something remarkable happens. Within seconds, the fish clots the wound and stops the bleeding. Cells start to divide to make new heart muscle and blood vessels. Two …

Growing stem cells isn’t just something junior faculty do in the lab. Eight of the junior faculty in the Department of Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine recently welcomed new babies into …

“The field of stem cell biology is one of our great convergence opportunities,” said USC Provost Michael Quick, addressing an audience of biologists, chemists, physicists, engineers, clinicians and many others. This diverse …

Students and trainees took center stage at the annual retreat for USC’s Department of Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine. They presented their latest research to the 180 stem cell scientists who …

If you lose a limb, it’s lost for life. If you damage a kidney, you won’t grow a new one. And if you have a heart attack, the scars are there to …

In a narrow room not much larger than a closet, Joycelyn Yip reaches behind a glass shield to lower a pipette to a plate of silicon-coated glass. Swaddled in a sterile white …

“I’ve always wanted to be in a textbook and impact the world,” said Gio Suh, who is graduating in December 2017 from the master of science program in stem cell biology and …

“The process of disease is about detail,” said Larry Goldstein, the director of the stem cell program at the University of California, San Diego, and keynote speaker at the retreat for USC’s …

“I think we’re all here for the same reason,” said Michaela Patterson, a postdoc in the Eli and Edythe Broad Center for Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at USC. “We’re considering …

Megan McCain, assistant professor of biomedical engineering, and stem cell biology and regenerative medicine, has been honored with the Chonette Early Career Chair at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering. As an …

Ching-Ling (Ellen) Lien, an investigator at The Saban Research Institute of Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA) and principal investigator with USC Stem Cell, has been awarded nearly $1.7 million, over a four …

Studying muscular diseases proves extremely complicated. The current system of studying muscle cells and tissues using animal models is often inconclusive and cost-prohibitive. Looking to improve the status quo, Megan McCain—a Gabilan …