Philip J. Horner

Philip J. Horner, PhD

Professor of Neuroregeneration, Academic Institute
Full Member, Research Institute
Scientific Director, Center for Neuroregeneration
Houston Methodist
Weill Cornell Medical College


Horner Lab - Neuroplasticity & Repair


Phone:
713.363.9046


pjhorner@houstonmethodist.org
Biography

Philip J. Horner, Ph.D., received a Ph.D. in physiology from Ohio State University in 1995. He did post-doctoral training with Dr. Fred H. Gage and became a staff scientist in the Lab of Genetics at the Salk Institute in 1998. In 2001, Dr. Horner joined the faculty of the Department of Neurological Surgery at the University of Washington in Seattle. He directed a laboratory at the UW South Lake Union Campus and was a member of the Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine. In 2015, Dr. Horner became the Scientific Director of the Center for Neuroregenerative Medicine and the Co-Director, Center for Regenerative and Restorative Neurosurgery at the Houston Methodist Research Institute in Houston Texas. Dr. Horner’s research focuses on the role of glial and neural progenitor cells in the regeneration of the injured and aging nervous system.

Description of Research

The Horner lab is focused on the interaction between glial and neural cells following central nervous system challenge and specifically: 1) mechanisms of adult stem cell-derived lesion remodeling/repair and 2) role of gliogenesis and gliosis in neural degeneration. Over the past decades, researchers have observed that the human brain and spinal cord retain a population of stem cells with the capacity to replace neurons and glia. However, during normal aging and following trauma or disease, the brain and spinal cord stem cells fail to replace needed circuitry. The Horner lab has been developing approaches to modify and amplify the fate of neural stem cells to increase cellular repair after spinal cord and brain injury. Together with electrical stimulation, the lab has shown that regeneration of neural circuitry offers hope for repair nervous system. Together with clinical research partners at Houston Methodist and our global partners, the Horner lab seeks to move from bench to bedside by engineering new neural circuits in people with chronic paralysis in order to restore hand function.  Neural regeneration strategies are also being applied to stroke, head injury, glaucoma and motor/cognitive decline associated with aging. 

Areas Of Expertise

Stroke Neural stem cells Myelin Optogenetics Neural trauma Regeneration Spinal cord Multiple sclerosis
Education & Training

MS, The Ohio State University
PhD, The Ohio State University
Postdoctoral Fellowship, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies
BS, University of Nevada, Reno
Publications

Mapping lumbar efferent and afferent spinal circuitries via paddle array in a porcine model
Steele, AG, Taccola, G, Frazier, AM, Manzella, M, Hogan, M, Horner, PJ, Faraji, AH & Sayenko, DG 2024, , Journal of Neuroscience Methods, vol. 405, 110104. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jneumeth.2024.110104

iDISCO Tissue Clearing Whole-Brain and Light Sheet Microscopy for High-Throughput Imaging in a Mouse Model of Traumatic Brain Injury
Flinn, H, Cruz-Pineda, L, Montier, L, Horner, PJ & Villapol, S 2024, . in Methods in Molecular Biology. vol. 2761, Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.), Humana Press, pp. 589-597. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-0716-3662-6_39

Novel site-specific neuromodulation of ventral spinal circuitry coordinating neural control of micturition after semi-chronic spinal cord injury
Salazar, BH, Hoffman, KA, Frazier, AM, Hogan, MK, Khavari, R, Sayenko, D & Horner, PJ 2023, , Scientific Reports.

Glial progenitor heterogeneity and key regulators revealed by single-cell RNA sequencing provide insight to regeneration in spinal cord injury
Wei, H, Wu, X, Withrow, J, Cuevas-Diaz Duran, R, Singh, S, Chaboub, LS, Rakshit, J, Mejia, J, Rolfe, A, Herrera, JJ, Horner, PJ & Wu, JQ 2023, , Cell Reports, vol. 42, no. 5, 112486. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2023.112486

Magnetic Resonance-Guided Stereotaxy for Infusions to the Pig Brain
Cruz-Garza, JG, Taghlabi, KM, Bhenderu, LS, Gupta, S, Pandey, A, Frazier, AM, Brisbay, S, Patterson, JD, Salegio, EA, Kantorak, CJ, Karmonik, C, Horner, PJ, Rostomily, RC & Faraji, AH 2023, , Journal of Visualized Experiments, vol. 2023, no. 193, e64079. https://doi.org/10.3791/64079

Rigor and reproducibility in analysis of rodent behavior utilizing the forelimb reaching task following a cervical spinal cord injury
Salazar, BH, Hoffman, KA, Fraizer, AM, Humes, F, Hogan, MK, Horner, MA, Yadegar, T, Trusler, S, Hamilton, GF & Horner, PJ 2023, , Behavioural Brain Research, vol. 439, 114188. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbr.2022.114188

Cortical stimulation leads to shortened myelin sheaths and increased axonal branching in spared axons after cervical spinal cord injury
Kondiles, BR, Murphy, RL, Widman, AJ, Perlmutter, SI & Horner, PJ 2023, , GLIA, vol. 71, no. 8, pp. 1947-1959. https://doi.org/10.1002/glia.24376

Screening Human Astrocyte Matrisome Components upon Synaptic Networks within Neural Organoids
Patel, M, Aghlara-Fotovat, S, Lavekar , S, Nasr Esfahani, S, Oji, S, Horner, PJ, Veiseh, O & Krencik, RC 2023, , Neuroscience 2023: Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, Washington, D.C. United States, 11/11/23 - 11/15/23.

Screening Human Astrocyte Matrisome Components upon Synaptic Networks within Neural Organoids
Patel, M, Aghlara-Fotovat, S, Lavekar , S, Nasr Esfahani, S, Oji, S, Horner, PJ, Veiseh, O & Krencik, RC 2023, , Mission Connect Symposium 2023, 11/17/23.

Mapping lumbar efferent and afferent spinal circuitries via paddle array in a porcine model
Steele, A, Taccola, G, Dietz, V, Frazier, A, Horner, PJ, Faraji, A & Sayenko, D 2023, , Society for Neuroscience, 11/11/23 - 11/15/23.

Rigor and Reproducibility in Analysis of Rodent Behavior Utilizing the Forelimb Reaching Task Following a Cervical Spinal Cord Injury
Salazar, BH, Hoffman, KA, Fraizer, AM, Humes, F, Hogan, MK, Horner, MA, Yadegar, T, Trusler, S, Hamilton, GF & Horner, PJ 2023, , Behavioural Brain Research, vol. 439, 114188. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbr.2022.114188

SARS-CoV-2 and the central nervous system: Emerging insights into hemorrhage-associated neurological consequences and therapeutic considerations
Mitra, J, Kodavati, M, Provasek, VE, Rao, KS, Mitra, S, Hamilton, DJ, Horner, PJ, Vahidy, FS, Britz, GW, Kent, TA & Hegde, ML 2022, , Ageing Research Reviews, vol. 80, 101687. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.arr.2022.101687

Effects of transcutaneous spinal stimulation on spatiotemporal cortical activation patterns: A proof-of-concept EEG study
Steele, AG, Manson, GA, Horner, PJ, Sayenko, DG & Contreras-Vidal, JL 2022, , Journal of neural engineering, vol. 19, no. 4, 046001. https://doi.org/10.1088/1741-2552/ac7b4b

Assessing Gq-GPCR–induced human astrocyte reactivity using bioengineered neural organoids
Cvetkovic, C, Patel, R, Shetty, A, Hogan, MK, Anderson, M, Basu, N, Aghlara-Fotovat, S, Ramesh, S, Sardar, D, Veiseh, O, Ward, ME, Deneen, B, Horner, PJ & Krencik, R 2022, , Journal of Cell Biology, vol. 221, no. 4, e202107135. https://doi.org/10.1083/jcb.202107135

Fully Characterized Mature Human iPS- and NMP-Derived Motor Neurons Thrive Without Neuroprotection in the Spinal Contusion Cavity
Olmsted, ZT, Stigliano, C, Marzullo, B, Cibelli, J, Horner, PJ & Paluh, JL 2022, , Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience, vol. 15, 725195, pp. 725195. https://doi.org/10.3389/fncel.2021.725195

Stereotaxic Atlas of the Human Lumbar-Sacral Spinal Cord
Grossman, RG, Tang, X & Horner, PJ 2022, , World neurosurgery, vol. 166, pp. e460-e468. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wneu.2022.07.017

Modulation of Neuroinflammation via Selective Nanoparticle-Mediated Drug Delivery to Activated Microglia/Macrophages in Spinal Cord Injury
Stigliano, C, Frazier, A & Horner, PJ 2022, , advanced therapeutics, vol. 5, no. 11, 2200083. https://doi.org/10.1002/adtp.202200083

Neuromodulation and restoration of motor responses after severe spinal cord injury
Sayenko, DG, Cerrel Bazo, HA, Horner, PJ & Taccola, G 2022, . in Cellular, Molecular, Physiological, and Behavioral Aspects of Spinal Cord Injury. Elsevier, pp. 51-63. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-822427-4.00005-8

Transcriptome of rat subcortical white matter and spinal cord after spinal injury and cortical stimulation
Kondiles, BR, Wei, H, Chaboub, LS, Horner, PJ, Wu, JQ & Perlmutter, SI 2021, , Scientific Data, vol. 8, no. 1, 175. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-021-00953-4

A contemporary review of therapeutic and regenerative management of intracerebral hemorrhage
Sadaf, H, Desai, VR, Misra, V, Golanov, E, Hegde, ML, Villapol, S, Karmonik, C, Regnier-Golanov, A, Sayenko, D, Horner, PJ, Krencik, R, Weng, YL, Vahidy, FS & Britz, GW 2021, , Annals of Clinical and Translational Neurology. https://doi.org/10.1002/acn3.51443

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