Shay Soker's Biography

Shay Soker, Professor of Regenerative Medicine and Chief Science Program Officer, Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine

Dr. Shay Soker is a Professor of Regenerative Medicine at the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative medicine and an affiliated Professor of Cancer Biology, Physiology & Pharmacology, Biomedical Engineering and Surgical Sciences. Dr. Soker developed programs in neo-vascularization of bioengineered tissues, including angiogenic gene transfer to enhance tissue vascularization, cell therapy using vascular cells and ex-vivo revascularization of bioengineered tissues and organs. His stem cell research focuses on the identification and isolation of stem cells from different sources, including adult and fetal stem cells from amniotic fluid and placenta, and their directed differentiation to generate tissues in vitro and in vivo. In parallel, Dr. Soker’s group is exploring tissue-derived extracellular matrices as scaffolds for whole organ bioengineering. Recently, Dr. Soker applied 3D tissue engineering and bioprinting technologies to develop small 3D tissue constructs (organoids) for studying tissue development, as human disease models, for drug toxicity testing and drug discovery. Some of Dr. Soker’s projects are now being discussed with industry collaborators in order to create new regenerative medicine product.