New integrated platform will transform early-stage research, equipping scientists worldwide to uncover disease mechanisms earlier and advance progress toward therapies for Alzheimer's, cancer, diabetes, Parkinson's, rare diseases and more

BAR HARBOR, Maine and NEW YORK, Oct. 20, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- The Jackson Laboratory (JAX), a global leader in genetics and genomic medicine, has completed its acquisition of the New York Stem Cell Foundation (NYSCF), a pioneering nonprofit dedicated to advancing cures through stem cell research. This unification creates one of the most powerful nonprofit engines for biomedical discovery, combining JAX's expertise in genetics and mouse models with NYSCF's advanced stem cell and automation technologies.

With complementary missions and shared values, JAX and NYSCF are uniting at exactly the right moment—when advances in genetics, stem cell science, and AI are giving researchers unprecedented tools to study biology. JAX is seizing this opportunity to build more advanced, predictive research platforms, helping scientists worldwide uncover disease mechanisms sooner and translating promising science into therapies with a higher chance of success.

"Bringing JAX and NYSCF together marks a turning point for biomedical research," said Lon Cardon, president and CEO of JAX. "By combining three powerful approaches – genomics, stem cell innovation, and data-driven AI – we are creating a platform that accelerates discovery from the very start of research and giving scientists stronger tools to turn early insights into breakthroughs for patients."

JAX's decades of experience in mouse models—essential for understanding complex physiology—are now paired with the NYSCF Global Stem Cell Array®, a cutting-edge robotic platform that supports large-scale, reproducible stem cell research. This technology makes it possible to investigate biology at the level of individual patients, generating insights that can drive more precise and effective treatments. When combined with both organizations' strengths in biomedical data science and AI-driven tools, this synergistic platform strengthens drug discovery that matters to human health.

Founded in 2005, NYSCF has pioneered the development of scalable stem cell platforms that allow scientists worldwide to study disease, discover drugs, and explore regenerative medicine. By joining with JAX, recognized for its deep expertise in genetics, quality standards, and leadership in NIH-funded research, the unified organization will provide the biomedical community with more powerful tools to model human health, test interventions, and improve reproducibility.

"From the beginning, NYSCF has been driven by the urgency to get cures to patients," said Daniel Paull, who led NYSCF's efforts to combine automation, imaging and AI to uncover hidden disease features and now serves as JAX's vice president of discovery and platform development. "Joining with JAX powers that urgency with an even stronger scientific engine. Together, we can move discoveries forward earlier and with greater precision, reducing the costly failures that too often derail later-stage clinical trials."

In practice, induced pluripotent stem cells can be transformed into any cell in the body, including brain cells to study Alzheimer's and ALS, or cardiomyocytes to study heart disease. With JAX's genetically diverse mouse models and NYSCF's automated array, researchers now will gain a powerful platform that allows them to predict treatment responses across populations, test those predictions on different human cells and validate results in whole organisms to generate insights that advance precision medicine.

The integrated JAX–NYSCF organization will continue to operate as a nonprofit, maintaining NYSCF's presence in New York and expanding JAX's international network of research campuses in Maine, Connecticut, California, Florida, and Japan. Together, the organizations are building a next-generation platform that sets a new standard for collaborative, scalable, and human-relevant biomedical research.

About The Jackson Laboratory

The Jackson Laboratory (JAX) is an independent, nonprofit biomedical research institution with a National Cancer Institute-designated Cancer Center. JAX leverages a unique combination of research, education, and resources to achieve its bold mission: to discover precise genomic solutions for disease and empower the global biomedical community in the shared quest to improve human health. Established in Bar Harbor, Maine in 1929, JAX is a global organization with nearly 3,000 employees worldwide and campuses and facilities in Maine, Connecticut, New York, California, Florida, and Japan. For more information, please visit www.jax.org.

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SOURCE The Jackson Laboratory