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
Center for Cardiovascular and Muscular Diseases, Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute (2025–2026) · Baxter Laboratory for Stem Cell Biology, Stanford University, with Helen Blau (2021) · Nestle Research and School of Life Sciences, EPFL, Lausanne, with Jerome Feige (2019–2024)
Sarcopenia is the loss of muscle mass and strength with age. It makes falls and frailty more likely, and no drug is approved for it. In a 2026 review in Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, with Helen Blau as senior author, Sara Ancel and colleagues survey the drug strategies now being tested. Among them are mTORC1 inhibitors, which may help because aging muscle has too little autophagy, the cell's clean-up system, and lowering mTORC1 activity can restore it. The review sets this against other approaches such as NAD-boosting molecules, urolithin A, myostatin blockers, drugs that mimic male hormones in muscle and blockers of the enzyme 15-PGDH. A review collects earlier work; it does not test these drugs itself.
Ancel trained in Lausanne, Switzerland, at Nestle Research and the School of Life Sciences of EPFL in Jerome Feige's group. There, Ancel was first author of a 2019 study showing that fat-forming progenitor cells in muscle help keep muscle stem cells young, and co-author of a 2019 Cell Stem Cell paper showing that aging disrupts muscle stem cells by reducing the protein WISP1 made by these neighbouring cells. In 2024, Ancel was first author of a study describing a two-colour reporter mouse for tracking different kinds of muscle stem cells in repair and aging.
Ancel co-authored a 2021 study from Helen Blau's lab at Stanford on heart muscle cells in muscular dystrophy, and now works at the Center for Cardiovascular and Muscular Diseases of Sanford Burnham Prebys in La Jolla. Ancel's exact position title could not be confirmed.
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 First author of the review of emerging drug treatments for sarcopenia, including mTORC1 inhibitors that restore autophagy in aging muscle. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 1
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Sara Ancel.
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- Helen M. Blau Stem cell biologist known for work on muscle stem cells, regeneration, cell reprogramming and rejuvenation, including how aging muscle loses strength.
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