Santiago Munné,
Ph.D. is a
founding member and vice president of Galileo Research Laboratories, LLC and
serves as the organization’s leader in the study of preimplantation
genetics. Dr. Munné has served as the director of
preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) at the Institute of Reproductive
Medicine and Science at Saint Barnabas Medical Center since 1995 and has
served since its founding as director of Reprogenetics, LLC, a laboratory
specializing in the provision of PGD services to IVF laboratories throughout
the US and abroad.
Dr. Munné, who is originally from Barcelona (Catalonia),
completed his Ph.D. in genetics from the University of Pittsburgh and joined
Dr. Cohen at Cornell University Medical College, New York in 1991.
While there he developed the first preimplantation genetic diagnosis
(PGD) test to detect embryonic numerical chromosome abnormalities to avoid
Down's syndrome and other abnormalities.
For this and related work Dr. Munné, was recognized with two
consecutive prizes, in 1994 and 1995, by the Society for Assisted
Reproductive Technology. Since
joining Dr. Cohen at St. Barnabas, Dr. Munné has developed the first test to detect
chromosome translocations in human embryos, which significantly reduces the
chance of miscarriage while at the same time helping to avoiding birth
defects associated with this condition.
For this work, Dr.
Munné was awarded the general Program Prize of the American Society for
Reproductive Medicine in 1996. Following
on his research on PGD of aneuploidy, Dr. Munne and his team demonstrated a
significant decrease in spontaneous abortions after PGD in women 35 and
older undergoing IVF and PGD, which was again recognized in 1998 with the
prize paper of the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology.
His PGD team has been able to increase implantation rates, and lower
spontaneous abortions and trisomic offspring in women of advanced maternal
age undergoing PGD.
Dr.
Munné and his team are recognized as the world’s leaders in the diagnosis
of translocations and chromosomal abnormalities related to advanced maternal
age. The focus of his current research activities is on the development of
new PGD techniques and on enhancing the understanding of the impact of
chromosomal abnormalities in human reproduction. Dr. Munné has authored
more than 100 publications, and is a frequent lecturer, both nationally and
internationally, on his team’s work and the field of preimplantation
genetics. Dr. Munné has held
faculty appointments at the University of Pittsburg and at Cornell
University Medical College, and is presently affiliated with Rutgers
University.
