Welcome to the Qyang Lab!

Our stem cell and regenerative medicine laboratory focuses on establishing novel cellular, tissue engineered, and animal models of human cardiovascular disease for the purpose of elucidating causative mechanisms and identifying therapeutic interventions to treat these diseases. Through a close collaboration with several clinicians at Yale, we are able to procure cells from healthy subjects and from those with clinically manifesting cardiovascular diseases. These cells include dermal fibroblasts derived from skin punch biopsies and peripheral mononuclear blood cells, which are reprogrammed into induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) by introducing stem cell factors. iPSCs are self-renewable indefinitely and can differentiate into functional cardiovascular cells. Our unique position, made possible by Yale’s clinical resources, gives us the ability to derive unlimited numbers of patient specific cardiovascular cells for use in our investigations into cardiovascular disease mechanisms and the discovery of potential therapeutic treatments by performing high-throughput drug screening. This research paradigm also places our group in a great position to generate autologous, allogeneic or hypoimmunogenic “universal” stem cell based cardiovascular tissues for organ repair.

1. Muhammad Riaz, Ph.D., has been promoted to Research Scientist at Section of Cardiovascular Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, Yale School of Medicine, since July 1, 2023.
2. Jinkyu Park, Ph.D. (graduated from Seoul National University, South Korea), postdoc training in Qyang lab (Dr. Park won a Department of Defense Award; $334,994; 1/1/2020-12/31/2022), now Assistant Professor in College of Medicine, Hallym University, South Korea.
   
3. Jiesi Luo, Ph.D. (graduated from Michigan State University, USA), postdoc training in Qyang lab (Dr. Luo won an AHA postdoctoral fellowship; 1/1/2019-1/1/2021), now Assistant Professor in School of Life Science and Technology, ShanghaiTech University, China.
   
4. Min Young Lee, D.V.M, Ph.D. (graduated from Chonnam National University, Korea), postdoc training in Qyang lab (2009-2012), now Professor in Department of Molecular Physiology, College of Pharmacy, Kyungpook National University , South Korea.
   
5. Esra Cagavi Bozkulak, Ph.D. (graduated from University of California, Los Angeles, USA), postdoc training in Qyang lab (2010-2012), now Associate Professor in Istanbul Medipol University, Regenerative and Restorative Medical Research Center, Department of Medical Biology, School of Medicine, Istanbul, Turkey.