Becoming whatever you want to be: lessons learned from a stem cell

Stem cells are extreme: they are the most powerful cells in our body and yet they are unimaginably scarce; they exist in nearly every tissue but actually locating them is enormously challenging. We believe that stem cells have the potential to transform the way we practice medicine, while at the same time their potential application to human disease continues to spark political debates around the world. My laboratory at Stanford works on this remarkable cell, and we believe that they hold answers to some of the pressing questions about the potential for tissue healing and regeneration in our bodies. Come join us in this conversation about stem cells, and both the hype and hope that surrounds their application to medical practice.While we will be focusing on the human body, we encourage participation from those students whose fields of interest fall well outside HumBio. Engineers, artists, historians, writers, economists--all will find intersections between the course subject matter, and their own interests. In this virtual class, we¿ll be taking advantage of a number of online tools including Zoom, Canvas, and Slack. Group work will figure prominently into this course, and we¿ll discuss and agree upon team charters to facilitate those collaborations. Finally, I recognize the challenge of bringing this class into a virtual world. There are plenty of obstacles to ¿distance learning¿: You might struggle to understand an assignment. You might find it is easy to be distracted. You might have an unreliable internet. I¿m here to tell you: we¿re in this together. We¿re navigating uncharted territory here! That means we¿re going to think creatively, we¿re going to speak up when we have questions or ideas or complaints or objections. We¿re going to learn and problem-solve and create like we¿ve never learned or problem-solved or created before. And when we fail, we¿ll try again. Come join us!