ENGINEERED PROTEINS TO REPAIR OR REGROW DAMAGED HEART MUSCLE CELLS AND TISSUE

Associate Professor Dan Hesselson,
Head of the Centre for Biomedical AI,
Centenary Institute
Sydney, Australia

RESEARCHER PROFILE
Filmed in Sydney, Australia | July 2026

Associate Professor Dan Hesselson leads the Centre for Biomedical AI at the Centenary Institute.

He is an internationally trained research leader in regenerative medicine, focusing on cells and organs affected by heart disease, diabetes and cancer. His work uses insights from the study of basic regenerative processes to identify novel therapeutic targets for these devastating diseases.

His work with zebrafish, which started at University of California San Francisco (UCSF) and was expanded at the Garvan Institute, made significant contributions to our understanding of the molecular mechanisms of regeneration in this highly regenerative model system.

At the Centenary Institute, he is focused on exploiting these breakthroughs in basic science to develop new therapeutic strategies using the power of Directed Evolution to generate potent and highly specific biologic drugs.

His research is investigating  new ways to repair the heart and improve outcomes for individuals recovering from heart attacks or living with heart disease, aiming to address a critical gap in cardiac care.

While current treatments can manage symptoms, they cannot restore heart function once muscle cells are lost. This irreversible damage is why heart failure remains a leading cause of death worldwide.

Associate Professor Hesselson’s research aims to address this challenge by developing therapies based on engineered proteins capable of repairing or regrowing damaged heart muscle cells and tissue.

Source: Supplied and adapted from Centenary Institute media release (June 2026)