Project Grant R21HD120909

The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development awarded The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York $444,824 on August 20, 2026, under the Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research program (CFDA 93.865) to engineer human pluripotent stem cell (HPSC)-derived endometrial organoids for modeling regeneration and disease mechanisms. The project will develop an innovative platform that recapitulates physiological interactions and developmental trajectories of the human endometrium by following the developmental trajectory of the Mullerian duct, allowing spontaneous emergence of endometrial epithelium and its associated stem cell niche. This addresses the lack of suitable human models for understanding endometrial regeneration and stem cell niche formation, which are critical to treating disorders including endometriosis, Asherman's syndrome, uterine fibroids, and unexplained infertility. The research will define the differentiation trajectory from Mullerian duct progenitors to endometrial organoids using single-cell RNA sequencing, computational lineage inference, and machine learning-driven tissue crosstalk analysis, benchmarking against human reproductive single-cell atlases to refine key signaling inputs. Performance occurs at Columbia University's location in New York, New York, with a period of performance from August 20, 2026, through August 31, 2028. The award is classified as a Project Grant (R21).