Ivan Maillard
Maillard’s main interest is to investigate the signals regulating the development and function of blood-forming stem cells.
Dr. Ivan Maillard earned his MD at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland and a PhD in Immunology from the MD-PhD program of the Swiss Academy of Medical Sciences. His graduate work with Heidi Diggelmann, MD aimed at understanding the complex interaction of mouse retroviruses with the immune system of their host.
He subsequently completed a post-doctoral fellowship with Warren S. Pear at the University of Pennsylvania, where he also worked as an instructor and physician in Hematology-Oncology. There, Maillard investigated the role of signals delivered by the Notch pathway in the development of lymphocytes and in the homeostasis of blood-forming stem cells. His work was supported by a fellowship from the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation.
He joined the Life Sciences Institute as a Research Assistant Professor and is affiliated with the U-M Center for Stem Cell Biology there. He is also an Assistant Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Hematology/Oncology. At the LSI, he will focus on studying the specialized microenvironment that nurtures blood-forming stem cells, using the mouse as a model organism. In particular, Maillard will investigate how these cells are supported in fetal hematopoietic organs, such as the fetal liver, the main site of blood development during fetal life before migration of blood-forming stem cells into the bone marrow. Understanding these interactions will lead to novel strategies to expand blood-forming stem cells in culture or to enhance their function after transplantation. In addition, it might provide insights into the function of stem cells in other contexts, including in cancerous tissues.
Another interest of the Maillard laboratory will be in the self-renewal and differentiation of mature T lymphocytes, a subset of lymphocytes that plays a critical role in immunization, anti-cancer responses and diseases such as AIDS and autoimmune disorders.
