User:Paine Ellsworth/Ildstad

Dr. Suzanne Ildstad is the Chief Scientific Officer and founding CEO of Talaris Therapeutics (her discovery of tolerogenic graft-facilitating cells led to the company's formation).[1] She is also the Jewish Hospital Distinguished Professor of Transplantation Research, Director of the Institute for Cellular Therapeutics, Professor in the Department of Surgery with associate appointments in the Departments of Physiology & Biophysics and Microbiology & Immunology at the University of Louisville School of Medicine.[2]

After earning her medical degree at Mayo Clinic Medical School, Ildstad did her surgical residency at Massachusetts General Hospital, an immunology fellowship at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and a pediatric surgery/transplant fellowship at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital.

Research
Dr. Ildstad's research is being translated into the clinical arena with FDA approval to enroll more than 200 patients in six different research protocols to treat autoimmune disease (multiple sclerosis) and red blood cell disorders (sickle cell anemia and thalassemia) and to induce tolerance to organ transplants (kidney, heart). Her research has been continuously funded by the NIH and other organizations since 1989.

Awards
Dr. Ildstad was the first woman ever to receive a Mayo Clinic Distinguished Alumnus Award, and she was selected as the Mayo Medical School Alumnus of the Decade in 2001. She has received a highly-competitive training grant from the NIH and has been awarded several peer-reviewed grants from NIH and JDRF. She has published more than 157 peer-reviewed articles in prestigious journals such as Nature, Journal of Experimental Medicine, Journal of Immunology, Transplantation, and Diabetes. She has recently received a prestigious and highly-competitive grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation to purchase state-of-the-art cell imaging equipment, allowing Institute scientists to observe cell behavior in real-time. She has authored over 230 manuscripts and is a named inventor or co-inventor on over 100 patents.