Dr Jatin Patel

Biography

Dr Jatin Patel (National Heart Foundation Future Leader Fellow) is vascular stem cell biologist, with his lab based at the Cancer and Ageing Research Program, QUT. For the past 8 years Dr Patel has extensively studied the mechanisms of vascular regeneration driven by tissue resident vascular stem cells and has studied these questions by using complex murine genetic systems as well as modelling in human placental tissue. Dr Patel is also utilising single-cell transcriptomic tools to further define the unique vascular stem cell population. This has provided a paradigm shift in our fundamental understanding of vascular regeneration and repair in the adult system both in homeostasis and pathology. The novelty of his findings around vascular stem cells have since been patented and is now being developed into a stem cell therapy to treat ischemic disease.

The future of stem cells offers great hope as the next wave of therapeutic options for cardiovascular disease patients. Importantly, stem cells provide an opportunity and mechanism for tissue regeneration, as opposed to treating only symptomatic disease, as is the case with many current clinical interventions. Dr Patel and his team are now positioning to bring forward a novel stem cell therapy to the clinic, with clinical trials now being planned.

Dr Patel was recently awarded a National Heart Foundation Future Leader Fellowship and the Paul Korner Innovation Award 2020. With this fellowship Dr Patel will be leading a research program studying the plasticity of tissue resident vascular stem cells in the development of atherosclerosis. This program is delineating the effects that excessive blood lipids are having on the self-renewal, function and fate choice of vascular stem cells from early atherogenesis to chronic atherosclerosis.