News
Guy Sauvageau Named Knight of the Ordre de Montréal
Published on May 6, 2026
On May 8, Professor Guy Sauvageau, Director of IRIC’s Molecular Genetics of Stem Cells Research Unit, will be presented with the insignia of the Ordre de Montréal as a Knight.
Recognition of Outstanding Contributions
The Ordre de Montréal is the highest honor awarded by the City, and pays tribute to its citizens who are committed to the community and contribute to the city’s reputation.
Professor Sauvageau, who is also a hematologist at Maisonneuve-Rosement Hospital, helped establish IRIC in the early 2000s as a founding member. His internationally recognized research aims to better understand the molecular basis of self-renewal in normal and leukemic hematopoietic stem cells.
In 2014, his team and that of Professor Anne Marinier made a major breakthrough: they identified the UM171 molecule, which, for the first time, enables the ex vivo expansion of hematopoietic stem cells. Initially used to expand cord blood stem cells prior to transplantation in over 120 patients, it has yielded impressive clinical results, appearing to outperform certain more standard transplants. A Phase 3 clinical trial has been approved and will begin shortly, with the goal of making the therapy accessible to a broader patient population.
Guy Sauvageau is also the scientific founder of ExCellThera, a biotechnology company developing new methods for culturing blood stem cells for therapeutic purposes.
