Doris Anita Taylor is an American scientist working in

regenerative medicine Regenerative medicine deals with the "process of replacing, engineering or regenerating human or animal cells, tissues or organs to restore or establish normal function". This field holds the promise of engineering damaged tissues and organs by st ...

and

tissue engineering Tissue engineering is a biomedical engineering discipline that uses a combination of cells, engineering, materials methods, and suitable biochemical and physicochemical factors to restore, maintain, improve, or replace different types of biolo ...

. She was the Director, Regenerative Medicine Research and Director, Center for Cell and Organ Biotechnology at the Texas Heart Institute in Houston, Texas until March 2020. She is the Co-Founder of Miromatrix Medical, Inc. and Co-Founder of Organamet Bio, Inc.

Biography

Taylor was born in San Francisco and lived in Germany with her parents and two siblings, where her father was in the military. When Taylor was 6 years old, her father was diagnosed with cancer, and the family moved to Texas to seek medical treatment. Experiencing her father's death from cancer, and caring for her brother, who had schizophrenia, led her to a career in medical research.Texas Medical Center Press Office. March 18, 201
TMC Spotlight: Texas Heart Institute's Doris A. Taylor, Ph.D.
/ref> Taylor earned her B.S. from

Mississippi University for Women Mississippi University for Women (MUW or "The W") is a coeducational public university in Columbus, Mississippi. It was formerly named the "Industrial Institute and College for the Education of White Girls" and later the "Mississippi State Coll ...

in Biology and Physical Sciences and earned her PhD in Pharmacology from the

University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center (UT Southwestern or UTSW) is a public academic health science center in Dallas, Texas. With approximately 23,000 employees, more than 3,000 full-time faculty, and nearly 4 million outpatient ...

, Dallas, Texas.Doris A. Taylor page at THI
/ref> She did her post-doctoral studies at

Albert Einstein College of Medicine The Albert Einstein College of Medicine is a Private university, private medical school in New York City. Founded in 1953, Einstein is an independent degree-granting institution within the Montefiore Einstein Health System. Einstein hosts Doc ...

in the Bronx, New York, where she first worked with tissue engineering, growing heart muscle cells in the laboratory. She was on the faculty of

Duke University Duke University is a Private university, private research university in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity, North Carolina, Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1 ...

from 1991 to 2007, on the faculty of the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...

from 2003 to 2012, and was with the Texas Heart Institute from 2012 to 2020. As of 2014 she retains an adjunct professor role at University of Minnesota and was an adjunct professor at

Texas A&M University Texas A&M University (Texas A&M, A&M, TA&M, or TAMU) is a public university, public, Land-grant university, land-grant, research university in College Station, Texas, United States. It was founded in 1876 and became the flagship institution of ...

until 2020.

Research

In 2008, Taylor's team published a paper in ''

Nature Medicine ''Nature Medicine'' is a monthly peer-reviewed medical journal published by Nature Portfolio covering all aspects of medicine. It was established in 1995. The journal seeks to publish research papers that "demonstrate novel insight into disease p ...

'' showing that her team could create beating rat hearts using

; the work was called a "landmark". The lab first stripped the cells away from a rat heart (a process called "decellularization") and then injected rat stem cells into the decellularized rat heart. Taylor also is conducting research which has uncovered differences in the underlying framework of male and female hearts and other vital organs.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Taylor, Doris Place of birth missing (living people) Year of birth missing (living people) Living people People from Mississippi Mississippi University for Women alumni 21st-century American biologists University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center alumni Albert Einstein College of Medicine alumni Duke University faculty University of Minnesota faculty Texas A&M University faculty