Roles
Professor of Surgery and Medicine
Chief, Division of Cellular Transplantation
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Biography
Camillo Ricordi, M.D. is Professor of Surgery, Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Miami (UM), Florida, where he serves as Chief of the Division of Cellular Transplantation, Department of Surgery, Director of the Cell Transplant Center and Director Emeritus of the Diabetes Research Institute. Ricordi has been serving as Medical Director of the NIH funded cGMP (current Good Manufacturing Practices) Advanced Human Cell and Biologic Product Manufacturing Facility since 1993, that has been providing an invaluable service distributing human tissues, cells and other biologic products, for research and clinical applications at UM, in the US and worldwide.
Ricordi completed high school with a perfect score and all graduate and post-graduate studies with the highest scores and honors in Milan, Italy. After medical school, board certification and military service as a medical officer in the Italian air force, he moved to Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, where he received an NIH Research Trainee Award (1986-1988) working with islet cell transplant pioneer Prof. Paul E. Lacy. Ricordi subsequently spent four years (1989-1993) with transplant pioneer, Prof. Thomas E. Starzl, as Director of Cellular Transplantation at the University of Pittsburgh Transplantation Institute. Since 1993, he has been working at the University of Miami (UM).
Acknowledged by his peers as one of the world's leading scientists in diabetes cure-focused research, cell transplantation and regenerative medicine, Ricordi is well-known for inventing the machine that made it possible to isolate large numbers of islet cells (insulin-producing cells) from the human pancreas and for performing the first series of successful clinical islet allotransplants that reversed diabetes after implantation of donor purified islets into the liver of recipients with diabetes. The procedure is now used by laboratories performing clinical islet transplants worldwide and in 2017 the first NIH funded, FDA Phase 3 multicenter trial was successfully completed by the NIH Clinical Islet Transplantation Consortium, chaired by Ricordi for over a decade. He has also developed highly innovative strategies with the objective to transplant cells and organs without the continuous requirement for anti-rejection drugs and for the reversal of autoimmune disease conditions. Ricordi’s research interests include the definition of anti-inflammatory nutrition, protective substances and regenerative medicine strategies, to prevent or treat chronic degenerative disease conditions, and to prolong healthy lifespan (Healthspan).
In 2020 he led the international team that successfully completed the first FDA approved controlled trial to treat the most severe cases of COVID-19 with stem cell infusions. The unprecedented results allowed for 100% patient survival at one month in subjects treated who were less than 85-year-old, compared to 42% survival in the control group.
Ricordi led the team that performed the first successful transplants of a bioengineered endocrine pancreas implanted within a 3D bioactive resorbable scaffold in the abdominal cavity of recipients with a severe form of Type 1 Diabetes and chaired for over a decade the steering committee of the first successful, NIH funded, FDA Phase 3 multicenter trial. He has also developed highly innovative strategies with the objective to transplant cells and organs without the continuous requirement for anti-rejection drugs and for the reversal of autoimmune disease conditions.
He led the international team that successfully completed the first FDA approved double blind, randomized controlled trial to treat the most severe cases of COVID-19 with mesenchymal stromal cell infusions that resulted in 91% patient survival at one month compared to 42% survival in the control group. Ricordi has also launched the program www.Fit4Healthspan.org to help the general population become resistant to severe viral infections through nutrition, fitness and selected protective molecules. These strategies are now also studied to prevent or halt progression of autoimmune diseases and age related chronic degenerative conditions, to prolong healthy lifespan (healthspan).
He is currently serving as SC Chairperson and UM-DRI Principal Investigator of the stem cell derived islet transplant trials (Vertex; VX-880) and within an immune-isolating device (Vertex; VX-264) without anti-rejection drugs. Ricordi is also working with iTolerance towards the first trial of stem cell derived islets within a tolerance inducing microgel, without chronic recipient immunosuppression (proof of concept trial planned for 2025).
Ricordi was president of the Cell Transplant Society (1992-94), co-founder and chairman of the National Diabetes Research Coalition (Chairman 1997), co-founder and president (1999-2001) of the International Association for Pancreas and Islet Transplantation (IPITA), and a member of the council of The Transplantation Society (2002-2008). He also served on the council of the American Society of Transplant Surgeons (2000-2002), on the National Institutes of Health (NIH-NIAID) Expert Panel on clinical approaches for tolerance induction, on the FDA Biologic Response Modifiers Advisory Committee, on the NIH/NCRR Islet Cell Resources (ICRs) Executive Committee, on the NIH-NIDDK Strategic Planning Committee and on the NIH-NIAID Expert Panel on Transplantation Research. He also served as Chairperson of the Clinical Islet Transplant Consortium (NIDDK-NIAID) and has been serving on several NIH study sections, including Surgery, Anesthesia and Trauma, the General Clinical Research Centers, Small Business Innovative Research, the Immune Tolerance Network, in addition to serving as a reviewer for several international funding agencies.
Ricordi has received numerous honors and awards, including the 2001 World Prize in Surgery (University of Geneva) for developing a technology that significantly contributed to the advancement of a surgical field. He was awarded the Outstanding Scientific Achievement Award by the American Diabetes Association (2002). He delivered the opening plenary (Galileo Lecture) at the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) Congress in Rome (2008). In 2009 Ricordi was Knighted by the President of the Republic of Italy in the highest Order of the Republic (the Order of Merit) with the Knighthood decoration of Cavaliere Ufficiale and in 2010 he was only surgeon and one of the few ever inducted into the Association of American Physicians (AAP). In 2011 he received the D-Life's Top Award for making the biggest difference in diabetes in 2010 (international web-based public vote competition). In 2018 Ricordi was inducted into the National Academy of Inventors for contributing outstanding inventions that have made a tangible impact on quality of life, economic development, and welfare of society. Ricordi ranked as #1 world expert in transplantation of insulin producing cells for treatment of diabetes, for the decade 2008-2018, among over 4,000 surgeons, physicians and scientists evaluated, and was appointed to the Supreme Council of Health (Consiglio Superiore di Sanita’) by the Ministry of Health of Italy.
Ricordi is currently serving on the editorial board of European Reviews for Medical and Pharmacological Sciences (Editor-in-Chief; www.europeanreview.org) He has served also on the editorial boards of CellR4 and Cell Transplantation (Founding Editor-in-Chief), the American Journal of Transplantation (Associate Editor), Transplantation, Transplantation Proceedings, Tissue Engineering, and Graft (Editor-in-Chief, 1998-2002).
Ricordi also serves as President of the Board of ISMETT (Mediterranean Institute of Transplantation and Advanced Therapies; http://www.ismett.edu) and was appointed President of Fondazione Ri.MED (http://www.fondazionerimed.eu) by the Italian Prime Minister, for the 2013-2017 term.
Ricordi was founding president of The Cure Alliance (www.thecurealliance.org) and Chairman of the Diabetes Research Institute Federation (http://www.diabetesresearch.org/Research-Collaboration), coordinating and promoting cure focused research at over 24 leading institutions worldwide, while further developing Telescience platform technologies to eliminate geographic barriers to scientific collaboration. These initiatives now allow scientists and project teams from around the world to work together like if they were in the same physical space.
Ricordi serves as consultant and/or on the board of advisors of several non-profit foundations, government and federal agencies, venture capital and investment funds, as well as pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporations.
Ricordi contributed over 1,170 publications, that received over 54,000 citations, has 112 H-index and 28 patents awarded.
In 2022 he published the best-seller book “IL CODICE DELLA LONGEVITÀ SANA” now available also in its English edition: “THE HEALTHSPAN CODE” (Amazon.com).
Contact Information: University of Miami, Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine - Diabetes Research Institute, 1450 NW 10th Avenue, Miami, Florida 33136. E-mail: ricordi@miami.edu -
Education & Training
Education
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Research Interests
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