The
scientists affiliated with Tyho-Galileo Research Laboratories, LLC are well
established in their fields and can count among their accomplishments many
of the most important advances in the treatment of infertility. Members of the
Tyho-Galileo research team and a brief summary of
their areas of interest are as follows.
Jacques Cohen, Ph.D.
is the founder and president of Tyho-Galileo Research Laboratories, LLC. Dr. Cohen has served as the Scientific Director of Assisted
Reproduction at the Institute for Reproductive Medicine and Science at Saint
Barnabas Medical Center in Livingston, New Jersey since 1995 and is
associated with several laboratories involved in IVF and PGD, both in Europe
and throughout the US.
Dr.
Cohen was trained at Erasmus University in Rotterdam, Holland as a
Reproductive Physiologist specializing in in
vitro fertilization and cryobiology. His initial studies of human embryology occurred in the late 1970s
and he was one of the first embryologists in Bourn Hall Clinic in the UK.
Dr. Cohen moved to the US in 1985 after having studied the
application of IVF in male factor infertility and the cryopreservation of
blastocysts. In Atlanta,
Georgia, he and colleagues developed methods for micro-surgically assisting
human fertilization, precursor methods to ICSI. The same team was
responsible for the development of assisted hatching and co-culture
techniques. In 1989, Dr. Cohen
became the Laboratory Director for the IVF program at Cornell University
Medical College in New York, where aneuploidy and mosaicism diagnosis, as
well as fragment removal, were added to the list of technologies in use in
assisted reproductive medicine. Dr.
Cohen and his team have continued their work on the development of new
methods in cryobiology and preimplantation genetics at Saint Barnabas
Medical Center and in the various other centers with which they are
affiliated.
Dr.
Cohen travels extensively and is a frequent lecturer at conferences and
seminars on topics in human fertility research worldwide. He has authored more than 200 publications, serves on the editorial
boards of numerous peer-reviewed publications and is widely recognized as a
leader in the science of reproductive medicine. Dr. Cohen has held faculty appointments at Emory University in
Atlanta, Georgia, at Cornell University Graduate School of Medical Sciences
and at Cornell University Medical College, where he was a tenured Associate
Professor of Embryology in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Dr. Cohen holds a faculty appointment at the College of Physicians
& Surgeons at Columbia University.
Santiago
Munné,
Ph.D. is a
founding member and vice president of Tyho-Galileo Research Laboratories, LLC and
serves as the organization’s leader in the study of preimplantation
genetics. Dr. Munné has served as the director of
preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) at the Institute of Reproductive
Medicine and Science at Saint Barnabas Medical Center since 1995 and has
served since its founding as director of Reprogenetics, LLC, a laboratory
specializing in the provision of PGD services to IVF laboratories throughout
the US and abroad.
Dr.
Munné, who is originally from Barcelona (Catalonia),
completed his Ph.D. in genetics from the University of Pittsburgh and joined
Dr. Cohen at Cornell University Medical College, New York in 1991. While there he developed the first preimplantation genetic diagnosis
(PGD) test to detect embryonic numerical chromosome abnormalities to avoid
Down's syndrome and other abnormalities. For this and related work Dr. Munné, was recognized with two
consecutive prizes, in 1994 and 1995, by the Society for Assisted
Reproductive Technology. Since
joining Dr. Cohen at St. Barnabas, Dr. Munné has developed the first test to detect
chromosome translocations in human embryos, which significantly reduces the
chance of miscarriage while at the same time helping to avoiding birth
defects associated with this condition. For this work, Dr.
Munné was awarded the general Program Prize of the American Society for
Reproductive Medicine in 1996. Following
on his research on PGD of aneuploidy, Dr. Munne and his team demonstrated a
significant decrease in spontaneous abortions after PGD in women 35 and
older undergoing IVF and PGD, which was again recognized in 1998 with the
prize paper of the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology. His PGD team has been able to increase implantation rates, and lower
spontaneous abortions and trisomic offspring in women of advanced maternal
age undergoing PGD.
Dr.
Munné and his team are recognized as the world’s leaders in the diagnosis
of translocations and chromosomal abnormalities related to advanced maternal
age. The focus of his current research activities is on the development of
new PGD techniques and on enhancing the understanding of the impact of
chromosomal abnormalities in human reproduction. Dr. Munné has authored
more than 100 publications, and is a frequent lecturer, both nationally and
internationally, on his team’s work and the field of preimplantation
genetics. Dr. Munné has held
faculty appointments at the University of Pittsburg and at Cornell
University Medical College, and is presently affiliated with Rutgers
University.
George Pieczenik, Ph.D.
is a founding member of Tyho-Galileo Research Laboratories, LLC and serves as the
team’s leader in the study of ligands and related basic research.
...to be continued.
James J. Stachecki, Ph.D.
has worked in the field of
reproductive science for more than 14 years and participates as a member of
the Tyho-Galileo research team as a staff scientist in the area of cryobiology.
Dr.
Stachecki obtained his master’s degree in genetics from Central Michigan
University and his Ph.D. in physiology from Wayne State University School of
Medicine in 1996 and has worked since then in the laboratory of Jacques
Cohen. With assistance from
Jacques Cohen and Steen Willadsen, Dr. Stachecki developed and patented a
freezing medium that has shown remarkable potential for improving gamete and
embryo storage. At the 1998
annual meeting of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, he
received the general prize paper award for his work in the area of oocyte
cryopreservation.
Dr. Stachecki has
published numerous manuscripts and abstracts in a wide variety of journals
including Development, Biophysics Journal, Biology of Reproduction, and
Cryobiology. The majority of
his recent research has focused on cryobiology, specifically the storage of
human oocytes and embryos. Recognized
as a top researcher in the cryobiology field, Dr. Stachecki is currently
working on improving methods of storing embryos, oocytes, and blastocysts
through conventional slow-cooling and vitrification techniques for a number
of species including humans. Dr.
Stachecki participates in the provision of clinical services as well, and is
particularly proficient in the performance of embryo biopsies and fixation
for PGD. In addition to his
scientific expertise he is proficient in the area of computer technology,
website design, and is a semi-professional photographer.
Nury Steuerwald, Ph.D.
is a senior member of the Tyho-Galileo research team and current serves as a
senior researcher for Reprogenetics and an Adjunct Research Scientist at the
University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
Dr. Steuerwald began her career in mathematics
and computer science, and went on to pursue advanced studies in reproductive
biology. Dr. Steuerwald
received a Ph.D., summa cum laude, from Florida International University in
Miami in 1999. She completed her dissertation research in the laboratory of
Drs. Jacques Cohen and Santiago Munné, with whom she collaborated to
conduct quantitative expression analysis in single oocytes with particular
emphasis on cell cycle regulation and checkpoint gene expression during
meiosis. Dr.
Steuerwald has been affiliated with several reproductive technology
laboratories, and made an
invaluable contribution to the formation of the Charlotte Genomics
Consortium. She worked
tirelessly to obtain DNA microarray technology that would enable her team to
identify clinically useful reproductive markers by providing a global
genetic perspective of reproductive tissues. Ultimately, they may be able to determine which reproductive markers
are critical indicators of prognosis and the differing factors between good
and poor responders of follicular stimulation. Dr. Steuerwald was an active participant in the planning committee
that prepared the successful grant applications to establish the microarray
facility and she remains an active member of the Executive Committee that
provides guidance and oversight to its operations. Given her background in computer science and biology, Dr. Steuerwald
is particularly interested in research involving the application of
bioinformatics.
Dr. Steuerwald and her
colleagues at UNC are currently collaborating with scientists at the
Institute for Reproductive Medicine and Science at Saint Barnabas to examine
gene expression during oogenesis and embryogenesis, and to conduct
experiments intended to elucidate the integrated mechanisms regulated by
nitric oxide in early embryonic development.
Dagan Wells, Ph.D.
is a key member of the Tyho-Galileo team and serves as senior staff scientist for
PGD research. To be continued…
Steen M. Willadsen, Ph.D., D.V.M.
is a key member of the Tyho-Galileo team.
He was the first person to clone an animal and has made significant
groundbreaking discoveries in the area of chimeric animals, and embryo
freezing. Dr. Willadsen hold
several patents. ….to
be continued.
Mina
Alikani, M.Sc.
is a founding member of the
Tyho-Galileo team and currently serves at
co-director of the In Vitro Fertilization Laboratory at the Institute for
Reproductive Medicine and Science at Saint Barnabas.
Ms. Alikani received a BA in Biology, with a
minor in Chemistry, from California State University, Northridge in 1983.
She went on to receive a Master of Science in Biology from California
State University in 1985, and wrote her master’s thesis on Immonufluorescence
Localization of Extracellular Matrix Component(s) in Two Species of Sea
Urchin. While completing
her studies at California State University, Ms. Alikani also served as a
research assistant and part-time member of the faculty in the Department of
Biology. Ms. Alikani worked from 1983 through 1988 as an embryologist
in the In Vitro Fertilization Program at Northridge Hospital Medical Center.
Ms. Alikani moved to Cornell University Medical Center in 1989, and
served as a senior laboratory supervisor in the Cornell IVF program until
1995, when she joined the team at the Institute for Reproductive Medicine
and Science at Saint Barnabas Medical Center in New Jersey.
Ms. Alikani has
published extensively in peer review journals and has authored and
co-authored chapters in a number of assisted reproduction text books. Ms. Alikani is a PhD candidate (by external mode) in the
Department of Reproduction and Development at Monash University in Clayton,
Australia, where Professors Alan O. Trounson and Steen M. Willadsen serve as
her advisor and supervisor, respectively.
