Dr Jordi Solana

Dr Solana is a developmental and computational biologist, specializing in stem cell research and regeneration in invertebrates. He primarily focuses on the freshwater planarian Schmidtea mediterranea. Over his career, Dr Solana has contributed significantly to single-cell transcriptomics, co-leading the first organism-level single-cell atlas. Dr Solana's team has developed innovative methods like ACME for dissociation and combinatorial single-cell transcriptomics, enhancing our understanding of planarian stem cell differentiation. The team has also explored stem cells in the regenerating annelid Pristina leidyi, analysed the cell types of the colonial cnidarian Hydractinia symbiolongicarpus, and are analysing atlases of various other regenerating organisms. Their future focus is decoding the transcriptional and epigenetic code of invertebrate pluripotent stem cells and their differentiation, contributing to the evolution of animal stem cells. Dr Solana's scientific journey, which began with a Ph.D. at the University of Barcelona, has led him through postdoctoral posts in the UK and Germany, ultimately bringing him to Oxford Brookes University, where he started my independent career, and now to the University of Exeter, where Dr Solana continues his passion for understanding stem cells and regeneration across the animal kingdom.

Qualifications:
2003 – 2008 Ph.D. student at the Department of Genetics of the University of Barcelona.
Advisor: Rafael Romero. 1997 – 2002 B.Sc. in Biology by the University of Barcelona.

Career:
2024 – present Senior Lecturer at the Living Systems Institute, University of Exeter, UK 2021 – 2024 Senior Lecturer at Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, UK 2017 – 2021 David Fell Research Fellow at Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, UK 2014 – 2017 Project PI (DFG Eigenestelle) at Nikolaus Rajewsky’s laboratory, Berlin Institute for Medical Systems Biology, Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine, Germany 2011 – 2014 Postdoctoral Researcher at Nikolaus Rajewsky’s laboratory, Berlin Institute for Medical Systems Biology, Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine, Germany. 2009 – 2011 Postdoctoral Researcher at Aziz Aboobaker’s laboratory, Institute of Genetics of the University of Nottingham, UK.