Dr. Denis Evseenko is currently a Professor and the Vice Chair for Research and the Director of Skeletal Regeneration at the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at University of Southern California. Dr. Evseenko is trained in both Medicine and Pharmacology and has a long-standing interest in stem cell biology and regenerative medicine. Evseenko’s lab aims to develop novel translational stem cell and small molecule-based approaches for articular cartilage injuries and arthritis. Evseenko’s Lab is using next-generation sequencing approaches to study the transcriptome and epigenetic state at different stages of normal human skeletal development as well as to understand key molecular circuits involved in cartilage commitment and differentiation. The laboratory is actively using pre-clinical in vivo models for cartilage and bone injury and repair. Recently developed transformative Plurocart® technology and novel modulators of gp130 receptor signaling have demonstrated excellent efficacy in large animal pre-clinical models and are now approaching human clinical trials. Dr. Evseenko is funded by the large-scale grants from NIH, DOD and CIRM. Dr. Evseenko is the author of numerous peer-reviewed research articles, presentations and patents. He is also a co-founder of CarthroniX, a biotech company formed to advance novel therapeutic strategies in the field of skeletal regeneration.