Dr. Roman Krawetz

Associate Professor, University of Calgary

In 2006, I completed my PhD with Dr. Greg Kelly from The University of Western Ontario, Canada. My thesis research examined how murine stem cells make the decision to differentiate into cells/tissues that make up the extra-embryonic structures that sustain the early embryo. The outcome of my research demonstrated that the cytoskeleton played a pivotal role in early fate specification, which was not widely accepted at the time, but this concept has gained significant traction within the scientific community.

In 2006, I was recruited to Dr. Derrick Rancourt’s laboratory at the U of C to pursue postdoctoral training. My work demonstrated the usefulness of mouse and human embryonic stem cells for regenerative medicine approaches in bone and cartilage tissue engineering. My research is best known for the innovative development of the first method to scale up the generation of human embryonic stem cells, and this work directly led to a co-senior authored Nature Methods study where a novel method was developed to generate clinically relevant numbers of Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPSCs).

Since January 1, 2013, I have been an Assistant Professor in the Department of Cell Biology & Anatomy and the dept. of Surgery. I am also a full member of the McCaig Institute for Bone and Joint Health. Our research in osteoarthritis and regenerative medicine has been funded by CIHR, NSERC, CIHR/IMHA, CFI, AO Foundation, Canadian Arthritis Network and Canadian Stem Cell Network. In 2013 I became the Grace Glaum Professor in Arthritis Research and in 2015 I was awarded a Tier II Canada Research Chair In Bone and Joint Stem Cell Biology.

I have always been fortunate to benefit from productive a range of mentorship experiences beginning as a trainee and progressing to mentor and supervisor; therefore, it is important to me to strike a balance between trainee participation in my research as well as developing opportunities that reflect the interests of everyone involved in the research. A unintended consequence of this approach is that sometimes trainees can start taking on a similar appearance and mannerisms.

Publications: Google Scholar