The Human Cell Atlas: from vision to reality

Abstract

This week, a year after project planning began, more than 130 biologists, computational scientists, technologists and clinicians are reconvening in Rehovot, Israel, to kick the Human Cell Atlas initiative1 into full gear. This international collaboration between hundreds of scientists from dozens of universities and institutes - including the UK Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, RIKEN in Japan, the Karolínska Institute in Stockholm and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts - aims to create comprehensive reference maps of all human cells as a basis for research, diagnosis, monitoring and treatment.