Actor Mitch Longley, regularly seen on NBC’s “Las Vegas,” has returned to his singing roots by creating a CD to celebrate and increase public education of stem cell research. Longley has used a wheelchair since his spinal chord injury in 1983. Songs for the Cell was recorded in June of 2007 at White House Productions in Shelton, CT.
On the album, Longley covers songs by some of his favorite artists such as Paul Simon, Bill Withers and Neil Diamond, plus standards like “Wish Upon a Star” and “Over the Rainbow.” He chose songs with lyrics that best express his experience of injury, recovery, healing and hope for the future. Longley felt the most effective way to share these feelings was to sing about them.Proceeds from the sale of this CD will benefit stem cell research facilities and subsequent clinical application programs. The UC Irvine Foundation and specifically, the Keirstead Lab will be the primary recipient of these funds.
KEIRSTEAD LAB:Run by Hans Keirstead, PhD, Associate Professor at the Reeve-Irvine Research Center, the focus of the Keirstead Lab is the development of strategies to limit degeneration and enhance regeneration after spinal cord injury, with emphasis on human embryonic stem cells. For more information about Dr. Keirstead and the Keirstead Lab, visit: http://www.reeve.uci.edu/faculty/faculty.php?page=hans.
For information about UC Irvine Foundation, visit http://www.foundation.uci.edu/about.asp.
Link to University of California, Irvine - Acknowledgement Letter
