More than 300 grants awarded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health over the past 10 months have proposed to engineer tissues to address problems of human health. This month, we offer a summary of some of the largest of those grants.
Chronic DTH and IFN-γ in Human Graft Arteriosclerosis(5P01HL070295-07, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, 8/30/07)
Jordan S. Pober
Yale University, New Haven, CT
$2,201,842.00
Goal: To elucidate the pathogenesis of graft arteriosclerosis (GA), the major cause of late cardiac allograft failure, in order to develop new strategies to prevent, treat, and diagnose this condition. The project will investigate features of graft endothelial cells that lead to selective recruitment, differentiation, and/or activation of host T cells that make IFN-γ and NO mediators of GA.
Center for Human Cell Therapy(5U24HL074355-04, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, 8/13/07)
Leslie E. Silberstein
CBR Institute for Biomedical Research, Boston, MA
$2,096,324.00
Goal: To provide basic investigators with resources to transform validated hypotheses into clinical applications: scale-up experimentation, high-end cell selection and culturing, biodevice and cell handling under GMP conditions, SOP development, IND development, and clinical trial development.
Engineered Cardiac Morphogenesis-Stem Cells and Scaffolds(5R01HL064387-07, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, 6/8/07)
Buddy D. Ratner
University of Washington, Seattle, WA
$2,001,635.00
Goal: To develop an engineering system for clinical repair of damaged heart muscle, specifically using proliferating human cardiomyocytes and a novel pro-angiogenic porous scaffold to engineer 300 µm diameter rods of cardiac muscle (RCM) or particles of cardiac muscle (PCM) that can be injected into a heart infarct zone and facilitate functional repair of cardiac muscle.
Regenerative Scaffold Technologies for CNS and Diabetes(5R01EB003806-04, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, 8/9/07)
Samuel I. Stupp
Northwestern University, Chicago, IL
$1,530,706.00
Goal: To investigate regeneration of the central nervous system (CNS) and cell replacement therapies for diabetic patients, developing multiple scaffold technologies and using CNS regeneration and pancreatic tissue replacement as their testing ground.
Self-Assembling Peptides for Tissue Engineering(5R01EB003805-03, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, 7/31/07)
Alan J. Grodzinsky (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA)
$1,285,095.00
Goal: To use self-assembling peptides to engineer the 3-D environment of cells with biologic functionality that can be modified and controlled—based on the basic biophysics of the materials, which can be tailored for specific cell types.
Cardiopulmonary Organ Engineering(5R01HL069368-05, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, 7/13/07)
William R. Wagner
University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA
$1,187,995.00
Goal: To design solutions for vascular, cardiac, and pulmonary organ failure by building interactive teams of researchers focused on specific aspects of cardiopulmonary organ engineering. The project includes elements: a tissue-engineered blood vessel, a myocardial patch, and a biohybrid lung.
Tissue Engineering of Hematopoietic Bone(5R01EB005173-03, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, 7/18/07)
Karen Hirschi
Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX
$1,107,420.00
Goal: To engineer hematopoietic bone ex vivo to treat disorders of both bone and hematopoiesis, specifically by producing bone that contains marrow with pluripotent, repopulating stem cells that can fulfill the long-term regenerative needs of patients, as well as provide structural integrity for the repair of bone defects.
Arterial-Mimetic Grafts Molded from Purified Proteins(5R44HL072670-03, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, 5/21/07)
David B. Masters
Gel-Del Technologies, Inc., St. Paul, MN
$1,025,888.00
Goal: To produce and evaluate biocompatible materials for small vascular grafts and overcome problems of blood clotting via fabrication processes that use purified proteins, water, and other biochemicals to produce biomimetic material in the shape of tubes that can mimic the wall structure of blood vessels.
The Harvard Urologic Research Center(5P50DK065298-05, National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, 8/22/07)
Michael R. Freeman
Children's Hospital, Boston, MA
$1,017,180.00
Goal: To integrate knowledge in basic cell biology, tissue engineering, biochemistry, molecular biology, proteomics, and genomics, developing the fundamental understanding necessary to produce innovative therapeutic options for a variety of common illnesses, including age-related and post-partum urinary incontinence, various forms of bladder instability, urinary tract complications of benign prostatic disease, chronic pelvic pain, and voiding dysfunction originating from congenital anomalies.
Data provided by NIH Sales, Inc., 2 Snowmound Ct., Rockville, MD 20850, USA.
Phone: 301-279-7175. Web address: www.nihsales.net
