The National Cord Blood Program is part of the New York Blood Center, a non-profit organization that provides blood, blood products and transfusion services to 20 million people in New York and New Jersey.

The New York Blood Center (NYBC) collects and distributes approximately 10 percent of the nation's blood supply and has a forty-year tradition of research in transfusion medicine through its Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute. The New York Blood Center organized one of the largest U.S. bone marrow donor groups as a member of the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) since 1987. In 2003, NYBC celebrated the 500th bone marrow donation by one of its donors.

Drs. Pablo Rubinstein and Cladd E. Stevens started the National Cord Blood Program (originally called the Placental Blood Program) at the New York Blood Center more than a decade ago and have directed it since. The NYBC's National Cord Blood Program has assembled a large inventory of cord blood units from ethnically diverse donors, enabling NCBP to serve the needs of patients worldwide.

Pablo Rubinstein, M.D., is the founder and Director of the NYBC's National Cord Blood Program. He specializes in Immunogenetics - the discipline that encompasses the structure and function of genes that regulate immune responses, control the acceptance or rejection of tissue and organ transplants and affect susceptibility to certain diseases. Dr. Rubinstein has headed the Fred H. Allen, Jr. Laboratory of Immunogenetics in the NYBC Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute since 1986 and is an Adjunct Clinical Professor in the Department of Pathology at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. He is the author of more than 200 research papers in the fields of Immunogenetics, cord blood banking and transplantation.

Cladd E. Stevens, M.D., M.P.H., is the Medical Director of the National Cord Blood Program. She trained in Pediatrics and Epidemiology, specializing in infectious diseases, especially those transmitted by blood or from mother to baby. She has been the head of the Wolf Szmuness Laboratory of Epidemiology of the Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute of the New York Blood Center since 1982 and is an Adjunct Professor in the Columbia University School of Public Health. Dr. Stevens has been a member of various advisory committees of the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and the Armed Forces, and is the author or co-author of more than 150 articles on viral hepatitis and AIDS and on cord blood banking and transplantation.

Ludy Dobrila, Ph.D., Associate Director, is in charge of the cord blood Processing Laboratory. She developed and implemented efficient and reliable methods for processing, cryopreserving, freezing and storing cord blood to maximize recovery of cells and retain their viability.

Carmelita Carrier, Ph.D., Associate Director, oversees HLA-typing and selection of cord blood units for transplantation, working closely with Transplant Center Physicians and Transplant Coordinators. She established HLA-typing by molecular methods and DNA sequencing for the Blood Center (ASHI accredited).

Rodica Ciubotariu, M.D., Ph.D., Associate Director, trains and directs NCBP staff at collaborating hospital collection sites and supervises the collection and characterization of cord blood donations to the NCBP.

Patricia E. Taylor, Ph.D., Associate Director, is a Microbiologist and supervises the bacteriology and hematology testing in the Wolf Szmuness Laboratory of Epidemiology and oversees special infectious disease testing.

Andromachi Scaradavou, M.D., a bone marrow transplant physician and Associate Director of the NCBP, collaborates with Transplant Centers in obtaining outcome data on patients given cord blood transplants from the NCBP. As a research scientist, Dr. Scarandovou developed a mouse model for basic research on cord blood transplantation.