Mona Barkat

After graduating from the Faculty of medicine, I was honoured to become an Assistant Lecturer at the Human Anatomy and Embryology Department, Faculty of Medicine, Alexandria University, Egypt. I found out that with practice, along with the direction of my professors, I had an affinity towards teaching and simplifying medical concepts for medical students. I carried out this task with a great deal of pride.

I have worked as a researcher in one of the highly promising laboratories in Egypt, the Centre of Excellence for Research in Regenerative Medicine Applications (CERRMA). This has provided me with the opportunity to work on a wide range of studies based on stem cell therapy.

I am passionate about neuroanatomy and stem cell research because stem cell research promises to have an enormous impact on human health and quality of life. My research agenda focuses on how to use stem cells in order to understand the pathogenesis of diseases and to provide useful information in developing therapies.

I had started working upon the idea of cellular transplantation in my masters thesis project where I investigated the regenerative capacity of adipose tissue derived mesenchymal stem cells in multiple sclerosis (MS).

My research project will investigate the basic behaviour of neuronal progenitors in the developing human brain and shall also investigate the various avenues to establish stem cell-based therapies to cure multiple neurological disorders that could damage the cerebral cortex, including stroke, and neurodegeneration.