This award by the Biomaterials program in the Division of Materials Research to Ohio State University is to study multifunctional hydrogels serving as stem cell carriers and having potential to be used for treating heart disease. Existing hydrogels for cardiac stem cell therapy are deficient in that they have low injection properties, limited cell survival, and unsuitable mechanical properties. These limitations compromise efficacy of cardiac stem cell therapy. To address above limitations, the work aims at generating hydrogels that are thermosensitive and injectable with injection properties suitable for delivery into heart by a simple injection approach, have biochemical microenvironment favorable for enhanced stem cell survival/growth, and possess heart-specific mechanical properties. Suitable mechanical properties allow hydrogel itself to provide an efficient mechanical support to heart tissue, prevent stem cell differentiation towards lineages unbeneficial to the improvement of heart function, and ideally direct stem cell differentiation towards desired lineages. In addition to graduate and undergraduate teaching and training, the proposed education and outreach activities include nationwide videoconferencing with high school students; increasing the participation of women in science and engineering; and providing underrepresented/minority students with unique research opportunities related to this project.
Heart disease affects several millions of people in US. Tissue engineering approach that combines biomaterials and stem cells has been used to treat this disease. Current biomaterials for this application have significant limitations, compromising efficacy of the therapy. The work aims to create novel biomaterials specific for cardiac therapy, which possesses appropriate biochemical and biomechanical properties for stem cell survival, growth and differentiation, and has potential to be delivered into heart using convenient, minimally invasive approaches. Successful accomplishment of the proposed research is expected to provide a platform for engineering biomaterials specific for other tissues. The biomaterials research overcomes existing challenges while being integrated with a multifaceted education and outreach plan. It includes nationwide videoconferencing with high school students to allow them to understand the importance of tissue engineering to human health, stimulating female students' interest in learning engineering, and providing unique research opportunities for underrepresented/ minority students to educate a new generation of biomedical scientists and engineers.
