Helen M. Blau
Stem cell biologist known for work on muscle stem cells, regeneration, cell reprogramming and rejuvenation, including how aging muscle loses strength.
Donald E. and Delia B. Baxter Foundation Professor and Director, Baxter Laboratory for Stem Cell Biology, Stanford · Stanford faculty since 1978 · National Medal of Science (2025)
Baxter Laboratory for Stem Cell Biology, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Stanford University School of Medicine (Stanford, California, USA) ↗ ORCID0000-0001-6503-5480 ↗
Portrait: Stanford University
Helen Blau studied at the University of York in England and earned her PhD at Harvard. After postdoctoral work at the University of California, San Francisco, she joined Stanford in 1978 and has directed the Baxter Laboratory for Stem Cell Biology since 2000.
Her lab studies muscle stem cells, how they repair muscle, and how cells can be reprogrammed or made younger. The Atlas includes a 2026 review in Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, led by Sara Ancel, on new treatments for sarcopenia, the loss of muscle mass and strength with age, for which no drug is approved.
The review compares several strategies. It highlights mTORC1 inhibitors for their ability to restore autophagy, the cell's recycling system, in aging muscle, and places this next to other approaches such as urolithin A and myostatin inhibitors.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | R | Strengthening Muscle for Healthy Ageing: Innovative Treatments for Sarcopenia ANC2026 Review of drug strategies against sarcopenia that highlights mTORC1 inhibitors for restoring impaired autophagy in aging muscle; Blau is senior (last) author. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 1
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Helen M. Blau.
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- Sara Ancel Muscle stem-cell biologist at Sanford Burnham Prebys, trained at Nestle Research and EPFL in Lausanne, who studies why muscle repair fails with age
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