Special Seminar - Translational Medicine: Engineering Dextrans for Therapeutic Vascularization and Tissue Repair
Date: April 9, 2012
Time: 12:30 PM
Location: Bossone Research Enterprise Center, Room: 709
Speaker(s):
Guoming Sun, PhD
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Johns Hopkins University
Details:
Slow vascularization of functional blood limits the transplantation of tissue constructs and the recovery of ischemic and wounded tissues. Without functional vascularization, oxygen, nutrition, and cells cannot diffuse into the constructs, and the newly formed tissues do not survive the transplantation. Despite the widespread investigation of polymer-based scaffolds for their therapeutic applications, blood vessel ingrowth into these hydrogel scaffolds remains a challenge.
In this talk, first I will present my recent work on how to manipulate dextran hydrogels for therapeutic vascularization. To promote angiogenesis or neovascularization, we developed tunable dextran-based hydrogels by incorporating different functional groups. To expedite angiogenesis, we then remodeled the hydrogel structure and encapsulated multiple angiogenic growth factors, which further improved the capacity of hydrogels to promote angiogenesis. We demonstrate that rapid, efficient, and functional neovascularization can be achieved via precise manipulation of hydrogel scaffold properties. To further evaluate the hydrogel potential aswound healing scaffold, we examined it in a burn injury model that follows current clinical practice. These wounds were covered with either dextran hydrogels or Integra (state-of-the-art product used in clinic), and non-treatment as control followed coverage with Duoderm dressings. The burnsite and surrounding tissue were collected at different time intervals and immunohistochemical stains for wound responses and skin regeneration were performed. The wound healing results indicate that the dextran hydrogel promotes neovascularization and more complete skin regeneration.
Biosketch:
Guoming Sun is an assistant research scientist of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. He received his doctoral degree from Cornell University in 2008. His research interests are primarily directed toward developing novel and biodegradable polymeric biomaterials for translational regenerative medicine. His current research focuses on engineering functional vascularized scaffolds for therapeutic vascularization and skin regeneration. He received several awards and scholarships throughout his doctoral studies and in 2009, he received the Maryland Stem Cell Research Fund Postdoctoral Fellowship.
Directions:
The Bossone Research Enterprise Center is located at the corner of 32nd and Market Streets.
|
