Michael A. Rudnicki

Michael Rudnicki is a Senior Scientist and the Director of the Regenerative Medicine Program and the Sprott Centre for Stem Cell Research at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute. He is Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Ottawa. Dr. Rudnicki is Scientific Director of the Canadian Stem Cell Network (SCN) and Chief Scientific Officer and Founder of Satellos Bioscience. Dr. Rudnicki’s achievements have been recognized by numerous honors including being named an Officer of the Order of Canada, a Fellow of the Royal Society (London), a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and International Research Scholar of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute for two consecutive terms. Dr. Rudnicki is an internationally recognized thought leader in molecular genetics and regenerative medicine whose research has transformed our understanding of muscle development and regeneration and has fueled the development of novel stem cell-based approaches to treat muscular dystrophy. Dr. Rudnicki discovered that the transcription factor Pax7 is required for adult muscle stem cell function, that muscle stem cells are a subset of satellite cells that self-renew through asymmetric divisions, and that Wnt7a regulates muscle regeneration. These studies led to the critical insight that the degree of asymmetric stem cell division controls the efficiency of muscle regeneration in ageing and in disease. Dr. Rudnicki discovered that the disease gene of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD), called dystrophin, is expressed in muscle stem cells where its loss results in perturbation of cell polarity, markedly reduced numbers of asymmetric divisions, and reduced generation of progenitors. This work is paradigm shifting, suggesting that DMD pathology originates in part from a defect in muscle stem cell function. Dr. Rudnicki’s research contributions have had important impact in the wider field of stem cell biology. His work has elucidated the function and control of transcription factors in the specification and differentiation of stem cells and progenitors during development and during tissue regeneration. His insights into the molecular regulation of stem cell asymmetric division have shown that the degree of asymmetric division significantly impacts the efficiency of regeneration, and that the process is regulated. Altogether, Dr. Rudnicki’s body of work has transformed our understanding of myogenesis and opened the door to new therapeutic strategies to treat neuromuscular disease. Dr. Rudnicki’s work is consistently published in top journals including Cell, Nature, Nature Cell Biology, Nature Medicine, and Cell Stem Cell. He holds major research grants from NIH, CIHR, SCN, and several health charities. Dr. Rudnicki is a member of the editorial boards of Cell Stem Cell, Journal of Cell Biology, and Stem Cells. He is a founding Co-Editor-in-Chief of the journal Skeletal Muscle. Dr, Rudnicki has also organized many international research conferences and was a founding Director of the Society for Muscle Biology. For the past 18 years, Dr. Rudnicki has led the Stem Cell Network (SCN), a transformative initiative involving over 175 investigators across Canada. As Scientific Director of the SCN, he has forged a national community that transformed stem cell research in Canada and brought research to the point where regenerative medicine is impacting clinical practice.