A grant from The Rosenkranz Foundation supports Thomas Rando's innovative work on the biology of aging at UCLA and their Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research. "Thomas Rando, M.D., Ph.D., is the director of the UCLA Broad Stem Cell Research Center at UCLA. In this role, he seeks to build on the Center’s strengths and to promote a culture of scientific excellence, academic integrity and interdisciplinary collaboration. He also works to establish partnerships with the larger scientific community—including other institutions and private companies—to address the most urgent challenges of medicine with the shared goal of improving human health.
His pioneering studies of the regulation of aging in mice showed that old tissues could be rejuvenated by exposure to young blood. These studies have formed the basis of an expanding area of research in the aging field and led to clinical trials of novel therapies for Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative diseases. Rando’s muscle regeneration and muscular dystrophy research informed the development of novel tools that enable non-invasive assessment of disease progression and therapeutic response in preclinical models of muscular dystrophies."