- About
- Strategic Plan
- Structure
- Governance
- Scientific divisions
- ACRF Cancer Biology and Stem Cells
- ACRF Chemical Biology
- Advanced Technology and Biology
- Bioinformatics
- Blood Cells and Blood Cancer
- Clinical Translation
- Epigenetics and Development
- Immunology
- Infectious Diseases and Immune Defence
- Inflammation
- Personalised Oncology
- Population Health and Immunity
- Structural Biology
- Ubiquitin Signalling
- Laboratory operations
- Funding
- Annual reports
- Human research ethics
- Scientific integrity
- Institute life
- Career opportunities
- Business Development
- Collaborators
- Suppliers
- Publications repository
- Awards
- Discoveries
- Centenary 2015
- History
- Contact us
- Research
- Diseases
- Cancer
- Development and ageing
- Immune health and infection
- Research fields
- Research technologies
- Research centres
- People
- Alistair Brown
- Anne-Laure Puaux
- Assoc Prof Joanna Groom
- Associate Profesor Ian Majewski
- Associate Professor Aaron Jex
- Associate Professor Andrew Webb
- Associate Professor Chris Tonkin
- Associate Professor Daniel Gray
- Associate Professor Diana Hansen
- Associate Professor Edwin Hawkins
- Associate Professor Ethan Goddard-Borger
- Associate Professor Gemma Kelly
- Associate Professor Grant Dewson
- Associate Professor Isabelle Lucet
- Associate Professor James Vince
- Associate Professor Jason Tye-Din
- Associate Professor Jeanne Tie
- Associate Professor Jeff Babon
- Associate Professor Joan Heath
- Associate Professor John Wentworth
- Associate Professor Justin Boddey
- Associate Professor Kate Sutherland
- Associate Professor Marie-Liesse Asselin-Labat
- Associate Professor Matthew Ritchie
- Associate Professor Melissa Call
- Associate Professor Melissa Davis
- Associate Professor Misty Jenkins
- Associate Professor Nawaf Yassi
- Associate Professor Oliver Sieber
- Associate Professor Peter Czabotar
- Associate Professor Rachel Wong
- Associate Professor Rhys Allan
- Associate Professor Rosie Watson
- Associate Professor Ruth Kluck
- Associate Professor Sandra Nicholson
- Associate Professor Seth Masters
- Associate Professor Sumitra Ananda
- Associate Professor Tim Thomas
- Associate Professor Tracy Putoczki
- Chela Niall
- Deborah Carr
- Dr Alisa Glukhova
- Dr Anna Coussens
- Dr Ashley Ng
- Dr Belinda Phipson
- Dr Ben Tran
- Dr Bernhard Lechtenberg
- Dr Brad Sleebs
- Dr Drew Berry
- Dr Gwo Yaw Ho
- Dr Hamish King
- Dr Hui-Li Wong
- Dr Jacqui Gulbis
- Dr Jim Whittle
- Dr Kelly Rogers
- Dr Lucy Gately
- Dr Margaret Lee
- Dr Mary Ann Anderson
- Dr Maryam Rashidi
- Dr Matthew Call
- Dr Nadia Davidson
- Dr Nadia Kershaw
- Dr Philippe Bouillet
- Dr Rebecca Feltham
- Dr Rory Bowden
- Dr Samir Taoudi
- Dr Sarah Best
- Dr Saskia Freytag
- Dr Shabih Shakeel
- Dr Shalin Naik
- Dr Sheau Wen Lok
- Dr Stephin Vervoort
- Dr Yunshun Chen
- Guillaume Lessene
- Helene Martin
- Joh Kirby
- Kaye Wycherley
- Keely Bumsted O'Brien
- Mr Mark Eaton
- Mr Simon Monard
- Mr Steve Droste
- Ms Carolyn MacDonald
- Professor Alan Cowman
- Professor Andreas Strasser
- Professor Andrew Lew
- Professor Andrew Roberts
- Professor Anne Voss
- Professor Clare Scott
- Professor David Huang
- Professor David Komander
- Professor David Vaux
- Professor Doug Hilton
- Professor Geoff Lindeman
- Professor Gordon Smyth
- Professor Ian Wicks
- Professor Ivo Mueller
- Professor James McCarthy
- Professor James Murphy
- Professor Jane Visvader
- Professor Jerry Adams
- Professor John Silke
- Professor Ken Shortman
- Professor Leanne Robinson
- Professor Leonard C Harrison
- Professor Lynn Corcoran
- Professor Marc Pellegrini
- Professor Marco Herold
- Professor Marnie Blewitt
- Professor Melanie Bahlo
- Professor Mike Lawrence
- Professor Nicos Nicola
- Professor Peter Colman
- Professor Peter Gibbs
- Professor Phil Hodgkin
- Professor Sant-Rayn Pasricha
- Professor Stephen Nutt
- Professor Suzanne Cory
- Professor Terry Speed
- Professor Tony Papenfuss
- Professor Wai-Hong Tham
- Professor Warren Alexander
- Diseases
- Education
- PhD
- Honours
- Masters
- Clinician-scientist training
- Undergraduate
- Student research projects
- A new regulator of 'stemness' to create dendritic cell factories for immunotherapy
- Advanced imaging interrogation of pathogen induced NETosis
- Cancer driver deserts
- Cryo-electron microscopy of Wnt signalling complexes
- Deciphering the heterogeneity of breast cancer at the epigenetic and genetic levels
- Developing drugs to block malaria transmission
- Developing new computational tools for CRISPR genomics to advance cancer research
- Developing novel antibody-based methods for regulating apoptotic cell death
- Discovering novel paradigms to cure viral and bacterial infections
- Discovery and targeting of novel regulators of transcription
- Dissecting host cell invasion by the diarrhoeal pathogen Cryptosporidium
- Do membrane forces govern assembly of the deadly apoptotic pore?
- Doublecortin-like kinases, drug targets in cancer and neurological disorders
- E3 ubiquitin ligases in neurodegeneration, autoinflammation and cancer
- Engineering improved CAR-T cell therapies
- Epigenetic biomarkers of tuberculosis infection
- Exploiting cell death pathways in regulatory T cells for cancer immunotherapy
- Finding treatments for chromatin disorders of intellectual disability
- Functional epigenomics in human B cells
- Genomic rearrangement detection with third generation sequencing technology
- How does DNA damage shape disease susceptibility over a lifetime?
- How does DNA hypermutation shape the development of solid tumours?
- How platelets prevent neonatal stroke
- Human lung protective immunity to tuberculosis
- Interaction with Toxoplasma parasites and the brain
- Interactions between tumour cells and their microenvironment in non-small cell lung cancer
- Investigating the role of dysregulated Tom40 in neurodegeneration
- Investigating the role of mutant p53 in cancer
- Lupus: proteasome inhibitors and inflammation
- Machine learning methods for somatic genome rearrangement detection
- Malaria: going bananas for sex
- Measurements of malaria parasite and erythrocyte membrane interactions using cutting-edge microscopy
- Measuring susceptibility of cancer cells to BH3-mimetics
- Minimising rheumatic adverse events of checkpoint inhibitor cancer therapy
- Mutational signatures of structural variation
- Naturally acquired immune response to malaria parasites
- Predicting the effect of non-coding structural variants in cancer
- Revealing the epigenetic origins of immune disease
- Reversing antimalarial resistance in human malaria parasites
- Structural and functional analysis of DNA repair complexes
- Targeting human infective coronaviruses using alpaca antibodies
- Towards targeting altered glial biology in high-grade brain cancers
- Uncovering the real impact of persistent malaria infections
- Understanding Plasmodium falciparum invasion of red blood cells
- Understanding how malaria parasites sabotage acquisition of immunity
- Understanding malaria infection dynamics
- Understanding the mechanism of type I cytokine receptor activation
- Unveiling the heterogeneity of small cell lung cancer
- Using alpaca antibodies to understand malaria invasion and transmission
- Using combination immunotherapy to tackle heterogeneous brain tumours
- Using intravital microscopy for immunotherapy against brain tumours
- Using nanobodies to cross the blood brain barrier for drug delivery
- Using structural biology to understand programmed cell death
- School resources
- Frequently asked questions
- Student profiles
- Abebe Fola
- Andrew Baldi
- Anna Gabrielyan
- Bridget Dorizzi
- Casey Ah-Cann
- Catia Pierotti
- Emma Nolan
- Huon Wong
- Jing Deng
- Joy Liu
- Kaiseal Sarson-Lawrence
- Komal Patel
- Lilly Backshell
- Megan Kent
- Naomi Jones
- Rebecca Delconte
- Roberto Bonelli
- Rune Larsen
- Runyu Mao
- Sarah Garner
- Simona Seizova
- Wayne Cawthorne
- Wil Lehmann
- Miles Horton
- Alexandra Gurzau
- Student achievements
- Student association
- Learning Hub
- News
- Donate
- Online donation
- Ways to support
- Support outcomes
- Supporter stories
- Rotarians against breast cancer
- A partnership to improve treatments for cancer patients
- 20 years of cancer research support from the Helpman family
- A generous gift from a cancer survivor
- A gift to support excellence in Australian medical research
- An enduring friendship
- Anonymous donor helps bridge the 'valley of death'
- Renewed support for HIV eradication project
- Searching for solutions to muscular dystrophy
- Supporting research into better treatments for colon cancer
- Taking a single cell focus with the DROP-seq
- WEHI.TV
Stem cells

Stem cells are unique cells in our body that can create and replenish diverse cell types – every type of body cell in embryos, and every type of cell in a particular organ in adults.
Our researchers are revealing how stem cells function, and the links between stem cells and cancer. We are also contributing to research into stem cell therapies of the future.
Our stem cell research
Our researchers are investigating many aspects of stem cell function, with the goals of:
- Defining how tissue-specific stem cells function in many organs including the blood, breast, brain and lung.
- Understanding which genetic modifications give stem cells their unique properties.
- Revealing the similarities between stem cells and cancer cells, and explaining how cancer can originate from defective stem cells.
- Advancing the clinical use of stem cells to treat many diseases.
What are stem cells?
Stem cells are unique cells that can divide indefinitely and give rise to many different cell types. Stem cells are critical for both:
- Embryonic development, in which stem cells produce different cell types in our body.
- Repairing and replenishing adult tissues, replacing cells that are damaged or are lost as part of their role in the body (such as the renewal of skin or immune cells).
Stem cells are considered ‘undifferentiated’, meaning they have not changed into, or committed to developing into, a specialised type of cell.
Stem cells can divide indefinitely. This is in contrast to most cells in our body which can divide only a limited number of times.
When a stem cell divides, it gives rise to two ‘daughter’ cells. Each of these cells can either:
- ‘Differentiate’ into, or commit to becoming, a mature cell, such as a lymphocyte or a neuron.
- Remain a stem cell. This is called ‘self renewal’ and ensures the body retains enough stem cells to continue to replace cells as needed.
Once a daughter cell differentiates, it cannot return to being a stem cell. The process of changing from a stem cell to a mature cell involves changes to which genes are switched on within the cell. Our researchers are discovering which genes are switched on in stem cells, but are epigenetically switched off when a cell differentiates.
There are two types of stem cells:
- Pluripotent stem cells, that can give rise to any type of cell in the body. These are the stem cells that are found in early embryos.
- Adult, or tissue-specific stem cells, that give rise to cells within a certain body system or organ. For example, blood stem cells replenish blood cells such as red blood cells and lymphocytes; breast stem cells can develop into any of the cell types in ducts of the breast.
Discovering stem cells and understanding how they function is giving new insights into how different tissues of the body develop and are maintained and repaired.
Our researchers were the first in the world to isolate breast stem cells, which give rise to the different, specialised types of cells within the adult breast. The information gleaned in this research is now being used to understand lung development, and reveal how developmental errors in the lung occur.
Stem cells in disease
Research into normal stem cell function is revealing how defective stem cells contribute to disease. Understanding the molecules that control stem cells is also providing new strategies for treating diseases associated with stem cells.
Stem cells and cancer
Stem cells share many features with cancer cells, including:
- Unlimited cell division.
- Ability to self-renew.
- Being undifferentiated.
Many genes involved in stem cell function are corrupted in cancer cells, providing cancer cells with stem cell-like features. A potential new strategy for treating cancer may be to deprive the cancer cells of their stem cell-like properties. Research suggests this may be enough to halt cancer cell growth.
Genetic changes in stem cells may contribute to cancer formation, at least in some organs. Cancer cells may also acquire the properties of stem cells, and behave as ‘cancer stem cells’.
Our researchers have discovered that breast cancer stem cells play an important role in the development of certain types of breast cancer. Other cancers may also arise from defective stem cells.
Stem cell treatments
Stem cells are the natural source of all the cells in the body. Many tissues, such as neurons in the brain and spinal cord, grow during embryonic development and childhood, but cannot be replenished in adults.
When an adult suffers brain damage, such as from a head injury or stroke, often the damaged neurons cannot be replaced. This means the damage, and the impaired brain function it causes, can be permanent. Many other organs also cannot fully repair themselves.
It is hoped that in the future clinicians may be able to re-awaken stem cells within our bodies to replace damaged tissues. Research explaining how stem cell function is controlled is providing insights into how stem cells may be manipulated to treat diseases.
Stem cell therapy is already a reality for blood diseases. Blood stem cells can be transplanted into people with problems producing enough blood cells, such as people with immunodeficiencies or who have been treated with chemotherapy. It is hoped that in the future, stem cell transplants will become a clinical reality for many more conditions.
Researchers:
Dr Shalin Naik co-hosts a new ABC TV health and medical science series, Ask the Doctor.
Our research has discovered stem cells in the adult pancreas that can be turned into insulin producing cells.
We have discovered that breast stem cells and their ‘daughters’ have a much longer lifespan than previously thought
Dr Matthew McCormack explains his research into a common type of childhood leukaemia.