The McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine held its 2017 Scientific Retreat March 5-7, 2017. The retreat provided many opportunities to explore collaborative endeavors with other researchers, participating guests, and external partners who are working to bring regenerative medicine technologies to clinical use. The 2017 Retreat program included technical and strategic planning sessions. The program was designed to facilitate insightful discussions and to identify opportunities for partnerships and new initiatives.
Program Highlights
The Keynote Lecture was presented by McGowan affiliated faculty member Dietrich Stephan, PhD, Professor and Chairman of the Department of Human Genetics at the University of Pittsburgh. Dr. Stephan shared his vision on the interface between personalized and regenerative medicine.
The Retreat included numerous general sessions throughout the 3-day event with a focus on these research and/or strategic planning areas: Craniofacial/Craniomaxillofacial, Cardiovascular, Manufacturing, NSF-ERC for Revolutionizing Metallic Biomaterials, DOD Needs, Pediatric, Wound Healing, Burns, Cell Therapy, and Vision & Hearing. Several trainee sessions were organized by Satdarshan (Paul) Singh Monga, MD, Andrew W. Duncan, PhD, and Kacey G. Marra, PhD. A special session on “Clinical Outcomes” was moderated by McGowan Institute faculty member Charles Sfeir, DDS, PhD, Associate Dean of Research in the University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine, and presented by McGowan Institute faculty member Bernard Costello, MD, DMD, FACS, Professor, the Chief/Division of Craniofacial and Cleft Surgery, and the Fellowship Program Director, in the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, University of Pittsburgh.
Poster Session
The poster session was effective in introducing the focus of the Retreat and interests of the faculty and the guests. McGowan Institute faculty member Andrew Duncan, PhD, Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology, Division of Experimental Pathology, University of Pittsburgh, and his committee organized the session and judged the posters. The winners of the poster session were:
Cell and Gene Therapy
First Place: Bing Han
Omental milky spots as sites for ectopic liver development
Mentor: Eric Lagasse, PharmD, PhD, Dept. of Pathology, University of Pittsburgh
Second Place: David Gau
Small molecule-mediated inhibitions of transcriptional cofactor MKL and its downstream target profilin impedes endothelial cell migration and angiogenesis
Mentor: Partha Roy, PhD, Dept. of Bioengineering, University of Pittsburgh
Third Place: Elizabeth Stahl
Accumulation of bone marrow derived macrophages in the aged murine liver
Mentor: Bryan Brown, PhD, Dept. of Bioengineering, University of Pittsburgh
Computation and Modeling
First Place: Lu Liu and Eric Lambert
High intensity focused ultrasound-sensitive perfluorocarbon nanoemulsions in targeted drug delivery
Mentor: Jelena Janjic, PhD, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Duquesne University
Second Place: Lisa Carey Lohmueller
Predicting all cause mortality for LVAD patients using Bayesian Networks
Mentor: James Antaki, PhD, Dept. of Bioengineering, University of Pittsburgh, and Dept. of Biomedical Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University
Third Place: Emily Ackerman
Controllability analysis of protein-protein interaction networks for antiviral drug development
Mentor: Jason Shoemaker, PhD, Dept. of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, University of Pittsburgh
Medical Devices
First Place: Firuz Feturi
Ultrasound Triggered-Release Embedded Anti-Rejection Therapy (TREAT) for targeted immunomodulation in vascularized composite allotransplantation
Mentor: Raman Venkataramanan, PhD, Dept. of Pharmaceutical Science, University of Pittsburgh, and Vijay Gorantla, MD, PhD, Clinical Initiatives and Research Innovation, McGowan Institute
Second Place: Akhil Patel
RegenMatrix: collagen-mimetic bioactive hydrogels for growth factor free approach for bone regeneration
Mentor: Shilpa Sant, PhD, Dept. of Pharmaceutical Science, University of Pittsburgh
Third Place: Puneeth Shridhar
Ventriculo amniotic shunt for fetal aqueductal stenosis
Mentor: Youngjae Chun, PhD, Dept. of Bioengineering, University of Pittsburgh
Tissue Engineering
First Place: Chelsea Stowell
Resorbable vascular grafts support early cell infiltration and endothelialization in a porcine vascular access model
Mentor: Yadong Wang, PhD, Dept. of Bioengineering, University of Pittsburgh
Second Place: Andrew Bradshaw
Modeling metastasis from invasion to colonization on a human physiomimetic chip
Mentor: Alan Wells, MD, DMS, Dept. of Pathology, University of Pittsburgh
Third Place: Ehab Tamimi
Biomechanical evaluation of gelatin/fibrinogen electrospun cylindrical scaffolds seeded with 3T3 mouse fibroblasts and porcine smooth muscle cells
Mentor: Jonathan Vande Geest, PhD, Dept. of Bioengineering, University of Pittsburgh
The poster session prizes were sponsored by sciVelo; the prizes were: first place ($200), second place ($125), and third place ($75).
CATER Program
First Place: Lindsey Saldin
Tissue-specific effects of normal, metaplastic, and neoplastic esophageal extracellular matrix hydrogels
Mentor: Stephen Badylak, DVM, PhD, MD, Dept. of Surgery, University of Pittsburgh
Second Place: Andrew Bradshaw
Modeling metastasis from invasion to colonization on a human physiomimetic chip
Mentor: Alan Wells, MD, DMS, Dept. of Pathology, University of Pittsburgh
Third Place: Colin Beckwitt
Adjuvant statin therapy efficacy is dictated by tumor dormancy and statin lipophilicity in ex vivo and in vivo models of metastatic breast cancer
Mentor: Alan Wells, MD, DMS, Dept. of Pathology, University of Pittsburgh
A special thank you is extended to all who made this year’s Retreat a success!
See the full Retreat Program here.