ABOUT US

Camillo Ricordi was born in New York, NY, and completed all his studies in Milan, Italy, with the highest scores and honors, starting from high school. After military service in the Italian Air Force as a Medical Officer, he worked at Washington University in St. Louis and at the University of Pittsburgh before moving to the University of Miami in 1993, where he served as Professor of Surgery, Medicine, Biomedical Engineering, Microbiology Immunology, and Director of the Diabetes Research Institute (DRI) for three decades. He currently serves as Chief of the Division of Cellular Transplantation, Department of Surgery, Director of the Cell Transplant Center, and Director Emeritus of the DRI.

Since 1993, he has been Medical Director of the NIH-funded DRI cGMP (current Good Manufacturing Practices) Advanced Human Cell and Biologic Product Manufacturing Facility, which has provided an invaluable service to centers throughout the United States and worldwide by offering training programs and distributing human tissues, cells, and other biologic products for research and clinical applications.

Acknowledged by his peers as one of the world’s leading scientists in diabetes cure-focused research, cell transplantation, and regenerative medicine, Ricordi is well known for inventing the technology (the Ricordi Chamber and Automated Method for Islet Isolation) that made it possible to isolate large numbers of islet cells (insulin producing cells) from the human pancreas. The method was eventually validated at Washington University in St. Louis, MO, where he served as an NIH Trainee. Recruited to the University of Pittsburgh Transplant Institute in 1989, he led the team that performed the first series of successful clinical islet transplants of donor pancreatic islets, reversing diabetes after their intrahepatic infusion. The procedure is now used worldwide by centers performing clinical islet transplantation.

Ricordi led the team that performed the first successful transplants of a bioengineered endocrine pancreas implanted within a 3D bioactive resorbable scaffold in the abdominal cavity of recipients with a severe form of Type 1 Diabetes. He also served for over a decade as Principal Investigator and Chair of the Steering Committee of the first NIH funded, FDA Phase 3 multicenter trial on islet transplantation in Type 1 Diabetes that was successfully completed in 2016. He has worked for decades to develop strategies for transplantation without chronic recipient immunosuppression and for the reversal of autoimmune disease conditions, and is currently serving as Chairperson of the International Steering Committee and UM-DRI Principal Investigator of the Vertex international clinical trial of stem cell–derived islet transplantation (VX-880). Ricordi is also co-leading a major collaborative islet transplant trial, at the DRI and the University of Chicago, to modulate the immune system without the toxicity associated with conventional immunosuppression, by replacing Tacriolimus with an antiCD40L monoclonal antibody (Tegoprubart, Eledon Pharmaceuticals). In addition, as Director of the Cell Transplant Center at the DRI, he is overseeing IND-enabling studies toward the first trial of islet transplantation combined with a tolerance-inducing microgel (iTolerance, Inc.) to avoid chronic recipient immunosuppression.

In addition to diabetes cure-focused research, Ricordi’s interests include Healthspan Medicine and regenerative biotherapeutic strategies to prevent or treat chronic degenerative disease conditions and to prolong healthy lifespan (Healthspan). In 2021, Ricordi led an international team that successfully completed the first FDA-approved trial to treat severe cases of COVID-19 ARDS with a cell therapy delivered to the lungs, resulting in 91% patient survival at one month post-treatment (100% in subjects younger than 85 years), compared to 42% survival in the control group. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he also launched a program to help the general population become resistant to severe viral infections through nutrition, fitness, and selected protective molecules. These strategies are now also being studied to prevent or halt the progression of autoimmune diseases (e.g., Type 1 Diabetes) and age-related chronic degenerative conditions (www.Fit4Healthspan.org). Ricordi also co-founded AION Healthspan, Inc., a University of Miami start-up regenerative medicine company whose first clinical trial to reverse diabetic nephropathy and other forms of chronic kidney disease is currently in progress.

Ricordi was the founding President of the Cell Transplant Society, President of the International Association for Pancreas and Islet Transplantation (IPITA), and he served on the Board of The Transplantation Society, the Board of the American Society of Transplant Surgeons, the FDA Biologic Response Modifiers Advisory Committee, and several NIH study sections, in addition to acting as an advisor/reviewer for several international funding agencies.

Ricordi received numerous honors and awards, including the 2001 World Prize in Surgery (University of Geneva) for developing a technology that significantly contributed to the advancement of a surgical field. He was awarded the 2002 Outstanding Scientific Achievement Award by the American Diabetes Association, and in 2009 he was knighted by the President of the Republic of Italy. In 2010, he was the only surgeon and one of the few ever inducted into the Association of American Physicians (AAP), and in 2018 he was inducted into the National Academy of Inventors (USA) for contributing outstanding inventions that have made a tangible impact on quality of life, economic development, and the welfare of society. Ricordi ranked as the #1 world expert in transplantation of insulin-producing cells for the treatment of diabetes for the decade 2008–2018 (Expertscape), among over 4,000 surgeons, physicians, and scientists evaluated, and was appointed to the Supreme Council of Health (Consiglio Superiore di Sanità) by the Ministry of Health of Italy. In 2023, he was awarded the Leonardo da Vinci Award (coshared with Nobel Prize laureates Yamanaka and Semenza at Taormina TaoBuk) and the Venice Golden Lion Award. In 2025, he received the PAIR Prize for American–Italian Relations, which recognizes individuals or institutions that have significantly contributed to strengthening the cultural, scientific, economic, or diplomatic ties between Italy and the United States. It honors leaders, innovators, and visionaries from diverse fields such as science, diplomacy, business, and philanthropy who have made impactful efforts to promote collaboration between the two nations.

Since 2004, Ricordi has served as President of the Board of ISMETT (Mediterranean Institute of Transplantation and Advanced Therapies), a joint venture between the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and the Italian Government, and was appointed President of Fondazione Ri.MED by the Italian Prime Minister for the 2013–2017 term, successfully completing the partnership with ISMETT for the creation of an unprecedented biotechnology center linked to ISMETT to foster clinical translation of novel therapeutics.

Ricordi was the founding President of The Cure Alliance and Chairman of the Diabetes Research Institute Federation, coordinating and promoting cure-focused research at leading institutions worldwide. He also serves as a consultant and/or member of the board of advisors for several non-profit foundations, government and federal agencies, venture capital and investment funds, as well as pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporations.

He was recently appointed by the Welfare Leadership of the Lombardy Region to assist in the establishment of a collaborative network between Italy and the US, to improve lifespan in physical, mental, and cognitive health by (1) preventing people from becoming patients, (2) reversing early disease progression, (3) treating those already affected, and (4) preventing disease recurrence after an initially successful intervention.

Ricordi also served as Editor-in-Chief and on several editorial boards of scientific journals, has contributed 1,250 publications, which have received over 63,000 citations (h-index 120), and has been awarded 28 patents. In 2023, he published The Healthspan Code, and in 2025, Therapeutic Revolution (Amazon.com).